Repairman Ace
by FleaBee
Summary: When destiny came knocking wanting a hero, the door was closed and another opened. Arnold Rimmer wasn't destined to be a Space Adventuring Hero, he was destined to go down a different path and be a different type of hero. AU of series seven and eight.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

"I won't do it," Arnold crossed his arms, glaring at the other version of himself. Ace didn't even look put out by his response, in fact he looked like he'd been expecting it. It was common knowledge among both parties that they didn't like one another, though Ace put on a good show of appearing that he liked his other self for the benefit of others around them. Arnold could read his other self like an open book, after all, who would know himself better than himself? Maybe, Dave Lister, he seemed to be able to read Arnold and know when he was upset when he was trying to hide his feelings from the others.

Ace kept his voice calm. "I know that you don't want to do it Arnie, but you are me. Another version of me. Believe me when I say you have it in you to be Ace, to do what I do. Haven't you always wanted to pilot your own ship?"

"I know I'm another version of you. You don't need to rub it in that you're the better version of me. Here's hopeless Arnie who never made it into the Space Corps. I'll let you know that I am already piloting my own ship! What do you think I have been doing for the last however many years? I have to do a little bit of everything and have been learning as much as I can to keep this rust bucket operational ever since I got my hard-light drive. Even before I got my hard-light drive."

Ace tried again. "Didn't you want to be like John, a test pilot in all the action? A hero who saves damsels in distress, where people worship the ground you work on. It's hard work, but it pays off at the end of the day. This is your chance to fill your childhood dream."

Arnold pressed his lips together. Ace still wasn't getting through to him, and they both knew it.

"Once I wanted to do all that. I wanted to rescue the girl and be a hero. Have people look up to me. The action, the excitement and everything that goes along with it. But I've come to realise, I like the quiet things in life. I don't want to be a space adventuring hero who always puts there life on the line for people that I don't know and will never see again. I have a hard enough time doing that for the people I do know and myself.

"I want to be my own person. I don't want to be like John, Frank, Howard, Uncle Frank and the last thing I want to be like is you. We may be the same person from different dimensions, but we are not the same. I don't have to follow in your footsteps. I am going to carve my own footsteps even if that means spending the rest of eternity with Lister, Kryten, and Cat in this pile of junk. You know what? I've done it for several years already and the rest of eternity doesn't look so bad."

Ace's smile still didn't falter. Arnold continued glaring at him from the other end of the bed Ace was lying on. The ship was quiet, the only sound was the hum of the engine, the occasional glitch of the dying light-bee and the heavy breathing of the two Rimmers. Ace knew that they could both continue on for hours, hours that Ace didn't have.

"Look, Arnie, I am dying, and I don't have much time. Wildfire brings me to a dimension to train the next Ace Rimmer. I am to train you with the little time I have." The concern showed itself on Ace's face. He was concerned that he was going to fail to get Arnold to accept and trained in time. He didn't want the legacy to end with him. "You can be a hero."

Arnold snorted. He didn't have a heroic bone in his body. Not that he had any bones being made up of light and all that. He was the last version of himself he would call on to be a hero. He was a snivelling, conniving coward who would throw his teammates to the lions or more likely GELFs or Simulants to survive. That was not the trait of a heroic person. Kryten had made a list of all his horrible traits.

"Even if I wanted to be Ace, which I don't. I wouldn't last five minutes. I am not going to put myself in danger intentionally when my T count is far too high during normal day-to-day operation. I wouldn't last a week. The first dangerous situation I came across and I would be burnt out before I could say Oh smeg." In truth, he wouldn't last a full day.

Ace didn't believe a word that Arnold said. Wildfire would never bring him to a dimension with an Arnold Rimmer who was close to permanent death. Before he could ask about the condition of Arnold's light-bee, he realised he was getting asked the question he was about to ask.

"Have you tried to fix your light-bee? What is even wrong with it in the first place?" Arnold asked, showing concern, a concern that he was trying to hide which Ace only recognised because they were the same person.

Ace opened his jacket which was hiding the leaking light, exposing the glitch in the projection system that was rapidly draining his power. "I'm beyond Wildfires repair capabilities. I know nothing about how to fix light-bees myself." The hologram was pale and sickly looking despite the fact that holograms weren't meant to get sick or suffer physical damage. Over the years, Arnold had discovered that just wasn't true. Holograms just got ill in a different way to humans. They could come down with viruses much like computer viruses, corrupted data and memory files, physical damage to the light-bee and or the holosuite would all cause permanent damage or death to a hologram.

Ace watched Arnold as he worked through something, finally coming up with an idea. Ace waited to see what Arnold would say. The look on his face was all too like the times when he tried to take on more than he could chew, but was overconfident in his abilities to do just that. Those moods usually lead to massive disappointment.

"I want to make a little wager with you," Arnold said, still radiating with confidence. "If I can fix your light-bee, I don't have to be Ace."

"If you fail you will fill my clothes and shoes, literally and become the next Ace Rimmer," Ace added to the bet. "I can agree to that."

After all, what did Ace have to lose? He was a dying man anyway. If by some miracle Arnold could save his life, he'd be the happiest man in the universe. The two Rimmer's shook hands, sealing the deal. Arnold didn't let go, helping Ace to his feet.

"We'll go to the medi-bay." Arnold continued talking as they went towards the small medical office that Starbug had to offer. "I've become pretty good at diagnosing my own light-bee issues over the years. I'm proud to say that I can even do most of my own maintenance since I become hard-light. I had to, you see. Especially after getting stuck on Rimmerworld alone for six hundred years. Of course, I can't do everything myself, just like a doctor can't do everything by themselves. I get Kryten and Lister to do everything that I can't do myself."

"Rimmerworld?" Ace questioned raising an eyebrow, stumbling slightly. He was expecting to fall flat on his face, but to his surprise he found Arnold wrapping his arm around him, keeping him upright the rest of the short walk to the medi-bay.

Arnold's face twisted as he considered if he'd answer the question or not. "Terrible place of my own creation. I got trapped on a planet for six hundred years with terraforming and cloning gear. Not a good combination if you ask me. It was a disaster waiting to happen. Thought that I'd clone myself so I didn't have to be alone until the others could collect me. Biggest mistake ever. Cowardly bunch of twats, they locked me up because I wasn't Rimmery enough. Me! The original. They put anyone to death who diverted from there so called perfect template. You should convince one of them to be the next Ace Rimmer."

Ace didn't believe a world Arnold was saying but found it was keeping him distracted from his upcoming death. "How did you manage to clone yourself when you are a hologram?" Ace asked, expecting to find a hole in the story.

Arnold looked embarrassed as he answered. "I had the scutters put a small portion of my ashes into my light-bee, so if I ever came across something that could clone myself again, I'd be able to clone a new body for myself. I didn't think of using my own remains the first time I found a machine that would have created an organic body. I spent hours looking for my old dandruff and skin flakes at the time. I'm now glad I put some of my remains into my light-bee. The rest of my ashes are on the Red Dwarf, wherever that is. I bet you think it's really morbid that I wanted to keep a part of my now dead body with me at all times."

Arnold helped Ace sit in the medi-bay. It looked rather primitive, and Ace really didn't think that anything in here would be able to help when state of the art Wildfire couldn't help him.

"I don't find that odd in the slightest Arnie, I actually kicking myself right now for not thinking of doing that myself. I was alive when I became Ace. My ashes are orbiting a planet, named Rimmerworld with all the ashes and light-bees of the Ace's that came before me. I wonder if it's the same planet as your Rimmerworld."

Arnold smiled, a genuine smile, that they did have something in common. Both men were glad that they didn't run into Kryten or Cat during the journey to the medi-bay. Ace wasn't looking well, and the droid and feline both worship the ground that Ace walked on would just to the wrong conclusion. They didn't believe he could do any wrong and would both accuse Arnold of hurting Ace even though that wasn't the case. They were not aware that said hero was already injured when he boarded the ship.

\- Red Dwarf -

Ace watched Arnold as he prepared the medi-bay with different tools, programs on the computer and several books. Muttering to himself as he prepared.

Filled with faked failing confidence, Arnold took a deep breath trying to calm his nerves. It was one thing to fix himself, it was an entirely different thing to fix someone else, though technically he was still fixing himself, just another version of himself.

"To start off with, I'm going to run two lots of diagnostics to get an idea of what areas I'll need to focus on repairing," Arnold explained, hands fidgeting and knee jiggling as he spoke. "The first lot of diagnostics are while you are awake and focuses on your physical operations, thoughts, movement, breathing and everything else to emulate a living person. The next lot of diagnostics require you to be offline. These diagnostics focus on the code and hardware that keep you online."

"Soft-light?" Ace enquired.

Arnold nodded, going over to the console he'd prepared earlier which had to wires that were leading back to the computer.

The leaking light was far worse in soft-light mode then it had been in hard-light mode.

Arnold scrunched up his face. "I've never done this to another hologram before." Trying to keep his hand's steady as he distorted Ace's image and connected the wires to the light-bee. As soon as the wires were both connected the computer started spitting out data. Ace gulped seeing his life expectancy. He didn't even have enough time to train a new Ace Rimmer.

The door whooshed open, startling Arnold. Ace turned his head, smiling at the young man who entered. "Evening Skip."

Arnold was relieved to see that it wasn't Kryten or Cat. Dave wouldn't jump to conclusions like the other two would.

Dave nodded to the two Rimmers. "Just checking to make sure you hadn't killed each other. I checked here first when I saw you were no longer in the bunkroom. Ace, you alight?" The last human wasn't fazed in the slightest by Ace's holographic status as he examined the diagnostic cables going back to the computer. Arnold wondered if perhaps Dave already knew that Ace was a hologram.

"Right as rain, Skipper," Ace replied in his ever-chipper voice. He was now hiding the pain he'd been showing to Arnold only moments before. If one thing could be said for Ace, he was a good actor. Yet Arnold could see through him, and he was sure that Dave could as well.

Arnold rolled his eyes. "He's lying. Unless he's referring to acid rain. Doesn't have long unless I find some way to fix his light-bee."

Dave looked over Arnold's shoulder at the diagnostics. "Should I get Kryten? On second thought, I wouldn't get him. This is outside Kryten's experience and all he'd end up doing it worrying and burning out his worry and guild circuits again because he couldn't help. Between the two of us we should be able to do something."

"You're both gems," Ace continued to attempt to charm them both despite the damage.

"Ace, I'm going to turn you off now. Time for the next lot of diagnostics." Arnold was fiddling with the console and flicked the switch to turn off Ace's projection as soon as he got the nod of consent. The projection vanishing and the light-bee falling to the bed. He saw acceptance in Ace's eyes moments before he was shut off. He thought he was never going to get turned on again and that this was his last moment alive. Arnold gulped, he didn't think he could be that calm in the face of his own permanent death.

Arnold and Dave looked over the diagnostics in silence. Ace's reading were not getting worse while he was turned off. The light-bee was physically damaged, a scorch mark, several indents and a large gash down one side exposing the chips and wires that made up the light-bee. Most importantly no green light was spilling out the light-bee while it was turned off.

"This will buy me some time to come up with something," Arnold sighed. Turning to Dave to explain how Ace managed to get his light-bee damaged and the bet he's made to fix Ace. "Why did I make such a stupid bet. I can't fix his light-bee. I can't do anything right. Why would I make a bet when I cannot repair my own light-bee."

There was silence for a few moments. "What problems do you have with your light-bee that you can't fix? I've seen you repair your own light-bee on many occasions when you thought no one was paying attention. Did you think of asking myself or Kryten to have a look at your problem?"

"My T count is running too high. Kryten already knows about it. My anxiety is causing my light-bee to go haywire. A person who suffers from anxiety and panic attacks is not meant to be turned on. Everything should be tickety-boo if we ever find the Red Dwarf. With the holosuite I'd be able to do more extensive checks to get to the root of the problem, unlike the primitive diagnostics Starbug has. It's all pointless really. I should give up now. Ace is doomed, and it's all my fault."

Dave put a hand on Arnold's should. "I've never known you to give up on something so easily. You always give yourself challenges that you cannot succeed in. This time I believe you can and even if you do fail, it's not like you could make things worse. He's going to die if you do nothing. This isn't putting you in any danger which is the only time you run." Arnold gave Dave a weak smiled. "Rimmer, you've done a good job keeping yourself running. How many other holograms can say they've been around as long as you have and still in working condition without regular contact with other holgrams or technicians who specialise in holograms? I'm not counting the holograms on holoships because they have each other and specialise in holograms."

"The only other hologram not counting Ace and the holoship holograms was on Nova 5. She was glitched, I had to turn her off because I couldn't fix her. She was stuck reliving the same moment over and over again." Arnold couldn't keep his pain and guilt hidden from Dave. What an awful existence. She was stuck like that for over a million years, almost three million and would've kept looping like that until her power ran out. I couldn't do anything to help her. All I could do was turn her off." He turned to Dave, grabbing both shoulders. "Dave, promise me if I ever get stuck like that. Turn me off. As much as I don't want to die. I would rather be dead then exist for eternity like that."

The conversation was making Arnold feel somewhat depressed. He couldn't save the Nova 5 hologram whose name he didn't even remember, and he couldn't save Ace either.

"Sure thing man. And while I live I'd keep looking for a way to repair you so I could have you back again. You're the one that keeps me same. The diagnostics are going to take a while, you should take a break. He's not getting any worse."

"I'm going for a walk," Arnold said, walking out of the medi-bay, heading towards there quarters. There weren't many places to chose from to go through a walk in the small ship. They had the drive room, kitchen and living area, medi-bay, Dave's room, Arnold's room, Cat's room, cargo bay and the computer room that they also had the VR equipment stored since there was no other place they could hook the gear up.

Arnold missed walking through the Red Dwarf. There you could walk the corridors for days on end and not see anyone for weeks at a time. Arnold stopped, looking out one of the portal windows. Wildfire was tethered to their ship, having no room to land. He couldn't be Ace, flying around it that small ship only designed for one person. He'd develop claustrophobia to add on top of his list of growing phobias. He'd go space crazy being alone without Dave, just like he had on Rimmerworld.

\- Red Dwarf -

Retreating to the small area that had been converted to a recreation area, Arnold sipped on a cup of tea. A mix to calm his nerves and to wait out the diagnostics from Ace. He looked out the portal. Maybe in another universe aliens existed. Perhaps if he became Ace, he'd meet some real live aliens that didn't want to kill him. It was so unfair that he'd spend hundreds of years in space and still had not come across aliens. Everything that was alien like originally came from Earth in one form or another.

He turned towards the door as he heard heavy footsteps that could only belong to Kryten unless they'd been invaded by mechanoids or simulants during the time he was lost in his thoughts about Ace.

Kyten stopped in front of him. "Ah, Mister Rimmer, sir, have you seen Mister Ace? I cannot find him anywhere." Concerned about Ace's well being but never seemed to show any concern for him. If he became Ace, would Kryten in other dimensions treat him like his Kryten treated Ace? He knew that the answer we yes. Did Ace have a Kryten in his dimension? What about Dave and the Cat? He assumed that he had Dave. It seemed that Arnold and Dave's lives were interconnected in some form between the other dimensions that they knew about.

"Last place I saw him was the medi-bay. He wasn't feeling himself after his last dimension," Arnold answered honestly without elaborating.

Kryten switched over to worry mode. "Mister Ace is unwell? I looked in the medi-bay and I could not see him. I must find him at once and help him if he's sick. Oh, poor Mister Ace."

Kryten was flustered as he started looking around the room and in the fridge and under the chairs.

"Kryten, it's nothing you need to worry yourself about," Arnold snapped. Why was it everyone had to care about Ace? What was so special about Ace? Ace was his concern right now and no one else's, well maybe Dave's since he was helping but not Kryten's and not Cats. "You probably missed him. Maybe he went for a walk like I did earlier."

Arnold watched Kryten continue his fruitless search for Ace. He could not believe that the mechanoid hadn't noticed the light-bee when he was in the medical bay earlier.

Arnold leaned back in his chair, rubbing his temples. What did Ace have that he didn't? What made him so appealing? Wasn't he just another version of him? How could he be despised so much and another version of himself be revered?

Cat would be happy if he left and never came back. Kryten also despised him even though he pretended he didn't. Dave was the only one that would maybe miss him, after all, he was brought back as a hologram to keep Dave sane and healthy. Why Holly chose him? He still wasn't sure, but it was probably because he'd already gone computer senile long before they'd lost the ship. Who knew what Holly was doing at that moment. The senile old dolt was probably the reason they'd miss placed the Red Dwarf in the first place. She probably didn't even realise they weren't on the ship when she'd flown off who knows where.

Arnold drained the rest of his tea. He'd had enough wallowing in self-pity, and the diagnostics that he was doing on Ace should be almost be completed.

\- Red Dwarf -

From years of reading his own diagnostic reports and manning the navigation consoles on Red Dwarf, Blue Midget and finally Starbug, Arnold had become rather good at understanding the reports generated from a Jupiter Mining Corporation systems. Reading a Space Corps report or the reports for the private section ships, stations and outposts was a different matter. He could not make heads or tails of those reports.

Arnold took the reports back to his room. It was going to take a while to read through the report, especially since it was a report that spat out numbers. If he rushed himself where numbers were concerned, especially when he was trying to show off to Dave and Kryten he'd end up making a bigger fool of himself then if he took his time. He was awful with numbers. He hated them and yet they were everywhere and seemed to be needed for everything.

Numbers were the reason he kept failing his Astronavigation and engineering exams. He had the books memorised, heck he had the Space Corps directives memories, all of them committed to memory and yet he could not remember what number they were assigned unless he started reciting them from the very begging and even then after a certain point he started getting the numbers mixed up. He had to take his time with numbers if he was going to help Ace.

He did have one thing on his side, Ace was not declining while turned off. If he'd been deteriorating still, Arnold would've ended up in a fluster making the mistakes that he commonly made.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold had picked up the report and read it in his room, he read through the report several times, a grin made its way to his face as he finished his final read through. He could actually do this. Ace's problem was something that he already knew how to fix. He even had the tools and the skills for once to fix the issues with Ace's light-bee. He couldn't believe it! It wasn't his luck, he had lousy luck. The luck must be Ace's luck.

With a skip in his step, Arnold returned to the medi-bay to put everything he needed together. Making sure he had all the steps sorted out in his head before he even touched the light-bee. Making a list and then a schedule for fixing the light-bee. Fixing Ace's light-bee would be time consuming. Arnold knew that he would eventually need Dave's help with welding the chips that required replacing. As a result of Arnold's anxiety, his hands shook and took a lot to steady his hands. Dave somehow had steadier hands when drunk then Arnold had on a day to day basis. When he got to the point of needing Dave's help, he'd ask him.

Satisfied that everything was in order, with his list and his schedule, Arnold picked up the light-bee to begin winning his bet with Ace.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold jumped when he heard his name called. Looking around, startled to find that he wasn't alone, he found Dave who looked at home in the chair next to the bed in the medi-bay, a mixture between bored and fascinated if that was even possible.

"When did you get here?" Arnold asked, surprised to find how much energy it took to talk.

Dave stood up, walking over to examine his work. "I think it was two hours ago. You looked busy, and I didn't want to disturb you." Dave was glancing at the schedule that was now pinned to the wall.

"So why did you disturb me now?" Arnold asked. He hated being disturbed, especially when he was busy with something. Arnold tried not to look at the schedule, he'd gone overtime, and that would cause a different bout of anxiety about underestimating how long each step was going to take.

"You're light-bee had been indicating that you need to recharge for the last half hour and you haven't done anything about it," Dave informed him.

Arnold heard the tell-tale beep that his light-bee emitted when he was due for a recharge. When he was on Starbug, and nothing was going on, he usually made sure to keep his light-bee charge enough to allow for unexpected situations. He hated the feeling of charging, something that he didn't need to do when he was running on the Red Dwarf since he could switch between the holographic suite and the lightbee. He hated the feeling of charging up after he'd gone entirely flat, something that he tried not to let himself do.

"You've done a lot of work so far. How's Ace?" Dave asked, examining each and every one of the wires that were coming out of Ace's light-bee.

"Better but not yet ready to turn on." Arnold took the seat that Dave had vacated. "I'll need your help eventually to replace the hard-light projection chip. It's almost burnt out and what is causing the green light that we witnessed leaking from him. The softlight drive will need to be put back in place, it's come loose. I've still got a long way to go with correcting the code that has become corrupted by the damage that was caused. His memory modules and personality chips are still in working order. I have removed both, so they don't become corrupted if anything goes wrong with the light-bee. A lot can go wrong."

Arnold had to pause as a wave of exhaustion hit him, once it passed he continued explaining to Dave what he knew so far, Dave returning to his seat, listening patiently as he spoke.

"As a last resort Ace's memory module and personality chip can be patched into a replacement light-bee. It is something that I would prefer to avoid doing. Do you remember that time when we swapped bodies?"

"Yeah, I remember. It was fun being in your body for a little while, but it felt off. It felt so good when we finally swapped back."

"According to the books that I've read with comments by the holograms who have experienced the swap, describe the feeling as being like a body swap. The closest I have experienced myself is when Legion upgraded me. I was so excited to be able to touch and feel again that I don't know if I felt lost or odd like the book describes."

Arnold rubbed his temples, as his lightbee beeped once again.

"Everything can wait for now, yeah? Because you really need to recharge."

Arnold nodded, struggling to stand to his feet. "Recharge time for me and bedtime for you after you help put me on charge."

\- Red Dwarf -

Starbug seemed to keep him on charge longer than necessary. Arnold wasn't sure if something was broken with the charging system, his lightbee or both. It was supposed to turn his lightbee back on as soon as the charge of the internal battery was at one hundred percent. Instead it kept him on charge for a full six hours after the charging was done. It only took two hours to charge, leaving him eight hours on the charger, throwing out his body clock since he didn't notice the passage of time while charging. He ended up staying on the charger for that amount of time if he charged overnight when everyone was sleeping, or no one thought to take him off charge or intentionally left him on the charger. Arnold missed the Red Dwarf's charging system where he was still aware of the passage of time when he was charging or would run off the internal systems.

He'd lost hours. It felt like he needed to go to bed and sleep when he finally came off the charger to start the day. Walking through the ship, he went to find Kryten to fix him up a meal before he continued working on Ace again. He missed having a night of dreams. According to all the books, Arnold had read about holograms, and how they are supposed to operate, holograms aren't meant to dream while asleep and yet Arnold still had dreams and nightmares even when he first became a hologram running off Holly's systems. A class one hologram the holoship holograms had called him since the Red Dwarf was using a second-hand holographic system that had originally been used by the Space Corps. Already an old system in his own time. Maybe dreaming was something that had been phased out in second generation holograms like the black and white of the prototype holograms.

\- Red Dwarf -

Three days and Arnold had spent it all in the medi-bay working on Ace. Kryten was upset, convinced that Mr. Ace was avoiding him. Cat was in his room trying to make himself look his best for the space hero he worshipped. Probably wanted fashion advice from the gimboid who looked like he was dressed to be roasted in his shiny jacket.

Dave had come and gone during the time, taking over Arnold's shifts of watching the cockpit. It was something that needed to be manned the majority of time in case of an emergency. The scanners which were unreliable after three million years of non-use was not something that Arnold wanted, or even Dave wanted to place their life on. Cat honestly didn't care less. The scanner needed to be repaired, but the problem was, none of the including Kryten knew how to go about fixing them.

Arnold looked up, seeing that Lister had once again joined him. It was good timing since he'd got up to the repairs that he would not be able to do on his own. He'd done all he could solo, and the last thing he wanted to do was muck something up because he grew overconfident or was too much of a coward to ask for help.

He knew that Dave would help, he cared about Ace, too much in Arnold's opinion. He wanted Dave to care about him in the way that Dave cared about Ace. He and Dave had been through so much together but Dave still liked and respected the space adventuring alter-ego more then he liked him as him. Arnold knew it to be true for a fact, he's been on the receiving end of it once before when a polymorph stole his fear, leaving him exactly like the pounce.

"Ah Listy, I was about to come looking for you. I'm up to the repairs which I need your help in." Arnold walked over, making Lister sit down to provide him detailed instruction on the repair that he couldn't do himself.

"Do you understand what you need to do?" Arnold asked after he'd finished going through the instructions.

"Rimmer, you have told me exactly what I need to do at every meal and before bed for the past three days. I know what I need to do. I put everything together except the memory and personality chips which we will put in later if everything goes well. Will you let me start? I'm ready as I will ever be."

Arnold stood back. He was nervous as he let Dave take over the repair. He continued telling Dave each step as the space bum worked. Dave dropped his tools, turning around, directly into Arnold's face. "Will you shut up already? Your backseat driving is distracting me. I - Can - Do - This. Just trust me. Go sit in the corner or recharge yourself until I am done."

Arnold grumbled, walking over the chair, huffing and crossing his arms as heavily sat in the chair. Dave was right, the last thing he wanted to do was cause Dave to make a mistake because he kept hovering. He cringed with each movement Dave made, biting his lip in order to try and keep himself from talking.

"Done, you can come over and look now," Dave said, wiping the sweat of his head and stepping back. Arnold was immediately at the bench, investigating Dave's handiwork. He made sure that everything really was in place and that they didn't have any leftover parts before closing the light-bee.

"Now to find out if the repair has worked," Arnold announced, connecting Ace up for another lot of diagnostic tests before they risked turning him on.

"No use hovering around here, we'll check what it say's in the morning," Dave said, placing a hand on Arnold's shoulder to lead him out of the medi-bay. Arnold knew Lister was right, but he didn't know if he would be able to get any sleep not knowing how Ace's condition was.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

It was early morning, and both men were up, heading to the medi-bay to check on Ace. Both men shared a relieved, tired grin as they finished reading the diagnostic reports. They'd come back with only a few minor issues that could be sorted out later. The important thing was the light-bee should not be leaking horrible green light anymore.

"So do we insert his memory and personality?" Dave asked while looking at the tiny chips that were in a glass container, so they didn't get lost or covered in dust.

Arnold replied, "First we turn him on to make sure he is projecting correctly."

So much could still go wrong as Arnold knew well being a hologram himself. Arnold turned the Ace on himself. It was a nerve wrecking moment for both men as they watched the lifeless hologram boot.

Eyes open and hollow, sitting slumped. On the positive, no light was leaking from the hologram as they had assumed.

Both Arnold and Dave let out a sigh of relief. Arnold switching Ace between soft-light and hard-light while connected to the diagnostic machine to see what reading they got. Another relieved sigh passed through both their lips as Ace switched between states and didn't spit out any unexpected errors.

They were both impressed with themselves. The space bum and high strung Ionian had managed to fix a hologram together without Kryten's help. Over the years they had come to rely on the mechanoid a lot. Too much in some cases. The humans could work well together before the mechanoid came along. Putting aside petty arguments and petty differences long enough to get themselves out of a jam and then back to bickering. These days Kryten did so much for them that they both stood to the sidelines only really helping when they were desperately needed, bickering at one another from the sidelines. They needed to start working together again and to stop relying upon Kryten for everything.

The door the medi-bay opened, disturbing the silence as Cat walked in. They had not seen the feline for a number of days. He finally looked like he was ready to see Ace, who wasn't in no condition to see anyone.

"What's wrong with him?" Cat asked, looking at Arnold as if it was his fault that Ace was looking like a zombie.

"Ace isn't feeling well at the moment, he'll be back to himself in no time," Dave told the Cat, getting up to push him out the medi-bay.

"Can you blame him, having to walk around looking like Goal-Post-Head. No wonder he ended up looking like a zombie. I heard zombie-ism is contagious, I'm getting out of here before I catch it," Cat stalked out the room, not really caring about Ace's condition despite the fact he was one of Cat's favourite people and that he'd spent days trying to impress him. He caught his sight in a reflection and yowled, impressed before leaving that area of the ship.

Arnold had to take several calming breaths to stop himself going after and shouting at Cat. Controlling his anger was still an issue for him, something that he had been working on, but just found so hard to do, like almost everything else he did. The things that seemed to come easily was annoying and alienating people. His T counts were too high to get angry over a petty comment that Cat made on a regular basis.

Dave had looked at the computer that had Arnold's vitals running on it all the time. Seeing the T count rising steadily he decided that the best course of action was to get the conversation back on track. "So do we put the personality and memory chips back in now, or do we wait? Everything looks good so far." Dave kept an eye on the T counter, noticing that it dipped slightly.

"I need a break first," Arnold said after much considerations. "Cat got to me," he admitted. "How about a meal break? The next part is going to take a while, and we haven't had breakfast yet."

Dave agreed, they both needed to be mentally alert before they started to replace the chips. He gave another worrying look at the T counter before they both left, hopefully, it would be lower after breakfast.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold needed rest, even if he wouldn't admit it. After finishing tea, Dave had claimed that he wasn't feeling up to putting the chips back in, sending his shift leader to the bunkroom to read. Checking up on Arnold ten minutes later, he found the hologram asleep with one of his novels over his face. Dave picked the book up, putting it back in its place. He knew that Arnold would get upset if he rolled and creased a page or ripped anything.

Taking a walk to the cockpit, Dave took a seat, looking out to the dead reaches of space.

"Mister Lister, sir. Mister Rimmer ordered me not to move the ship several days ago," Kryten complained, rather upset about the order. They'd decided not to move since they didn't want to accidentally run into a threat and the movement of the ship was not ideal for some of the repairs they would be doing, especially when the chips were reinserted and having Wildfire tethered to them, it wasn't ideal to be moving anyway.

"I know Kryten, he discussed with me what he was going to do before he spoke with you," Dave replied, realising that he should have gone and spoken to Kryten right away rather than letting him steam for a few days about Arnold's order.

"Are you sure I shouldn't move the ship yet, sir? We've been sitting here for days." Kryten confirmed it was something Dave agreed with.

"Kryten, it's fine to stay here. Just keep an eye on the scanners. Ace is in the medi-bay at the moment. Rimmer and I couldn't risk running into asteroids, black holes and whatever other dangers that have almost wiped us out several times already. We'll let you know when we can move again if nothing comes up."

"Mister Ace? Why didn't you tell me he wasn't feeling well, I could've helped you," Kryten insisted as he went into worry mode.

And that was the reason he had not spoken to Kryten earlier, he would've blurted about Ace, and then he would of had the mechanoid in the medi-bay killing Arnold's confidence, which was very fragile.

"We know Kryten, but you see both Arnold and I have felt like we rely on you too much. We love relying on you Kryten, we really do. But we've forgotten how to do certain things ourselves. So we have both been looking after Ace. If things turned hairy, we would've got you. It wasn't anything personal, and we want to make sure if things get hairy that we'd be able to look after you if we ever need to."

"Are you sure we really can't move? What about GELF's, simulants and other threats? We lost the Red Dwarf trail months ago. If we don't keep looking for it, we will lose the trail even more then we already have and become more lost." Kryten reminded him of the predicament they were in.

Dave longed for his home on Red Dwarf, more then he longed for his home on Earth, and he knew that Arnold had considered Red Dwarf his home for years before the accident that trapped them in deep space. But it might be time to give that dream up and just find somewhere safe to live, safter then Starbug.

"Kryten, we are more likely to run into them while moving. As for the Red Dwarf, we lost the trail months ago. Who's to say we are even going in the right direction anymore. How about you see if you can find the trail again until Rimmer and I are finished with Ace? This should not be too much longer. Ace is on the mend now." Lister replied. Smiling to himself, it was the truth, Ace was on the literal mend.

"Maybe Ace can give us an idea of what direction we should be heading. Then we can continue on as normal." Kryten stood to walk towards the medi-bay.

"What? Bumbling around the universe with the empty goal of getting back to Earth? If we are found by anything that wants to kill us, we will move." Dave said knowing that was still on Kryten's mind. "Just say here, we've got everything else covered.

"If you insist. I will keep Starbug cockpit covered. Would you like dinner now, sir?" Kryten asked.

"Actually Rimmer and I just had breakfast not too long ago," Dave replied, regretting what he said immediately. "But I'll have dinner."

\- Red Dwarf -

"Why didn't you wake me?" Arnold whined as they walked back towards the medi-bay.

"If you're sleeping that long you needed it," Dave rolled his eyes. He couldn't believe Arnold sometimes. If he woke him at a weird time, he'd wake up cranky. There were set times to wake Arnold up. "It's not like Ace is waiting for us. He's still on the diagnostic machine, so we get more readings and stuff."

Arnold spent several moments reading over the new diagnostics once they were in the medi-bay. "Everything is all tickety-boo," Arnold had a grin plastered from ear to ear. This was a positive tickety-boo and not the way Arnold used the word when things weren't alright but he wanted them to be and no one else to know that they weren't. "It's now a case of inserting the final two chips."

It wasn't a task that was quick as they both assumed. Dave was extremely glad that they had rested before tacking the task since it ended up taking an entire day to get the tiny chips inserted. They weren't designed to be looked at by people. They were designed to be looked at by robots that were specially designed to fix the light-bees, and from the reading, Arnold had been doing, he knew that there were smaller light-bee's out there then when he was using. Some light-bees were as tiny as a pinhead. He didn't understand how something so small could project an entire hologrammatic person.

"Now we turn him on," Dave said, throwing the light-bee into the air to regenerate and not giving Arnold a chance to go over the diagnostics again. He knew that Arnold would panic about all the fine details if everyone wasn't perfect and they wouldn't be perfect.

They both held their breath, waiting for Ace to respond. He looked more lifelike then when they'd booted him previously. Ace glanced around the room, his eye's landing on both men before looking down at his own body, feeling himself and switching between soft-light and hard-light.

"You really fixed me?" Ace asked, his pitch high and nasally like Arnold's own. He looked at them both, not believing that he had really been fixed. "Arnie, you did it. You really did it. I'm not dying. You fixed me." Ace exclaimed, getting up and pulling Arnold into a hug of thanks. He started sobbing on Arnold's shoulder. "I thought I was done for."

Arnold looked at Dave for help, unsure what to do, even if the person who was seeking comfort was another version of himself. Thankfully, Dave knew what he was doing, taking over and comforting Ace, patting him on the back in a hug until he was settled enough to listen to them.

"I didn't fix you alone. I cheated and had Listy help. I didn't follow our agreement," Rimmer rambled.

Ace rolled his eyes, turning to Arnold. "Arnie, our agreement never said that you couldn't have help in repairing me. In fact, I prefer to live then die because you didn't ask for help when you needed it. A step I don't think I would've been able to take myself before I came Ace. You've come a long way, a lot further then I thought. You don't mind if I have the old girl look everything over?" Referring to the computer of the Wildfire.

Arnold rolled his eyes. He would've just gone ahead with the diagnostics without asking.

"Yeah, sure, go ahead," Dave answered.

\- Red Dwarf -

Dave had gone to find Kryten to get him to set up some lunch for them all to share now that Ace was out of the medi-bay. He'd happily got to work preparing the best of what they had, which wasn't much. Arnold had actually stopped eating real food a while ago because supplies were short. Once Ace had returned, Cat had slinked his way into the recreation area to join them over a meal, and Arnold had come back out of hiding, after much needed time to himself.

"Everything is hunky dory with Wildfire," Ace told them as he sat down to join them for what they were calling lunch despite none of them knowing what time of day it was.

They shared a light meal, Kryten fussing and Cat hero worshipping Ace. Once Cat got bored, Ace excused himself. "It's been a long day Kryten, if you excuse me, I will be returning to the medi-bay."

"Of course Mister Ace. Is there anything I can bring you?" Kryten requested.

"No, old chum. I've already have everything I need."

"Of course sir," Kryten nodded.

"We have something we need to attend to," Dave indicated to himself and Arnold. "Think you're right here to clean up Kryters?" Dave asked.

"Of course sir," Kryten replied.

\- Red Dwarf -

Dave and Arnold both followed Ace to the medi-bay.

Ace turned towards the two men, only talking once the medi-bay door closed. "Arnie, I've been speaking to Wildfire. As part of our agreement, you don't have to be Ace, unless you chose you want to?"

"Why would I chose to do that?" Arnold asked, not able to think of any reason why he'd put his existence on the line.

"Because Dave isn't going to be around forever. There will become a point where you don't care if you live or die because he's not around anymore. Being Ace gives you the chance to see Listy again, even if he's not your own."

Arnold closed his mouth tight, pressing his lips together. He didn't want to imagine a life without Dave, but it had become so much easier to see, especially after Rimmerworld.

"How do you know that?" Rimmer glared.

"From experience." Ace dodged the question, looking away.

"So you leave now?" Dave asked.

"I'm going to spend a night resting before I go. Being offline doesn't make it seem very restful and is always jarring after waking up." Ace replied.

"You're Dave died, didn't he?" Dave asked Ace, seeing that Arnold didn't even question the statement.

"Yes, of old age thank God. There were some hairy situations over the years where I thought we were both not going to make it. This isn't about me, this is about you, Arnie. Wildfire has agreed to you not being Ace, but has another request. She would like you to continue repairing light-bee's, of the other Ace Rimmer's who cannot be repaired by her. She's always assumed if a light-bee was beyond her repair, that this is impossible. But you have proven that Wildfire was wrong in this case. Arnie, will you become the office Ace light-bee repairman? Fixing the Arnold Rimmer's of the multiverse who need repairing?"

Arnold looked at Dave, wondering if this offer was some type of joke, some horrible joke. A trick to get his confidence up, only to be taken away moments later like what had happened so many times over the years.

He started back at Ace in disbelief, pointing to himself. "You want me, a hopeless goit who can't do anything right to repair light-bees? You want to trust me, intentionally with other people's lives?"

"You are not hopeless, Arnold." Ace said, dropping the Ace Rimmer voice, which threw Arnold especially the use of his first name instead of a nickname. "You are not hopeless, and neither am I. It was something that took me a long time to accept. Longer then it should. Accepting that I am not hopeless was hard to hear when I grew up with those around me calling me hopeless, bonehead, slow, wet, weak along with other names. My parents, brothers, family, teachers, Church congregation, schoolmates, work colleges, teachers, my Lister and Cat and the list, goes on. It's not true. You are hopeless at some things, that is true. However, you are not hopeless at everything. You proved that you are not hopeless at everything when you repaired me. Your area of expertise is just different than my own. You may not be able to fix every light-bee that comes your way. But the ones that you do fix, you are giving a longer life too. A life that they would not have had before."

"Really? You really think I can do this?" Arnold turned to Dave, who was also encouraging him to accept Ace's offer. "I'd be honoured to accept," Arnold beamed. "Can you imagine, me fixing holograms? My parents would not believe it, same with my brothers and probably anyone else that knew me." After basking in his accomplishment, Arnold turned back to Ace. "What about the ones that I can fix? What happens if they need more training? Am I expected to train them as well? I can't do that? I don't even know what training and Ace needs. What happens to the ones I can't repair?"

"The ones that are repaired, Wildfire will deal with taking them to someone that can train them if they need more training. You don't need to worry about that. As for the ones that can't be repaired, We'll leave you a few coffins. They take the coffin containing the light-bee's to a planet that we call Ace Rimmerworld. It's the location most Ace's both alive and dead go to rest."

"What about the ones that don't go there?"

"They have someone left behind to take their remains, usually Dave Lister. Or other arrangements in place. My remains are going to be buried next to my Lister when I do go. Arnie, it's going to be a blessing having you on the team." Ace pat Arnold on the shoulder. "Now if you don't mind, I need some rest. I have no idea why I still need sleep, being dead and all."

\- Red Dwarf -

The four members of the Red Dwarf crew who were stuck on Starbug stood near the airlock in the cargo bay to say goodbye to Ace. Arnold and Ace had stayed out of each other's way while Ace caught up with Dave, Cat and Kryten.

"I'll keep an eye out for your Red Dwarf, maybe it will turn up in a dimension and have the same coordinates here." Ace said. Turning to Arnold and Dave. "Thank you for everything." He hugged both men, Arnold actually accepting the hug. "I'll be back next time I get myself into a kip."

"Just don't let it be too soon. I need to recover from this time first, and then there is the issue of supplies." Arnold replied, already cataloguing what he would need to strip from derelicts and stations.

"Don't worry too much about supplies, Wildfire will bring you what you need," Ace promised.

Kryten was crying when Ace hugged him. "I am so sorry that you were in the medi-bay for so long Mister Ace. If I had known I would have helped. I wish I could've done more to help during your stay."

"It's fine Kryten, you were in the cockpit keeping up safe while Arnie and Skip helped me out." Ace clapped the droid on the back one final time before a quick conversation with Cat.

"Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast," Ace gave them all one last salute before he left through the airlock, using a suit and helmet to give the appearance he was still alive.

Arnold watched as Wildfire disappeared from their dimension. He hoped that it was a very long time before he saw Ace next. With a yawn, he headed towards the living quarter's to sleep for a week or two.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Despite having his own room on Starbug, during the day Arnold still spent most of his time in Dave's room when he was not watching the cockpit. Cat was on shift at the moment and Kryten was somewhere cleaning. Dave was alone, standing in front of the mirror, trying to pull nose hairs out with tongs.

Arnold tutted, seeing Dave in a pink dressing gown that Kryten had found the day before and washed up for the last human to wear. Sadly being on Starbug, they didn't have much in the way of clothes. Rimmer wore holographic clothing most of the time, so he didn't ruin the few uniforms that he had on Starbug. Why did he have real uniforms on Starbug when he'd been a soft-light hologram? Well, he wanted something in his room when they moved a few things in. This was only supposed to be a holiday home, not a permanent home. But when Dave was bringing things down to the ship, he'd insisted that he would have a wardrobe with clothes and shoes in it, taking up space that wasn't really needed at the time. Said clothing was old uniforms that he didn't really have an interest in wearing anyway.

Arnold's room was a lot tidier than the pigsty that was Dave's room. Probably sterile actually. It didn't really feel like a bedroom that belonged to someone on a permanent basis with no personal touch that said a person actually lived in the room. Even though Kryten cleaned every day, Dave's room was always a mess and being honest, it actually wasn't a pigsty anymore, especially not in comparison to their shared room on the Red Dwarf.

"What are you doing?" Arnold asked, watching Lister trying to pluck nose hairs out. Didn't he know that it would be so much easier if he used the tool that was invented to pluck out nose hairs, like real tweezers? They had a heap in the medi-bay, and yet Dave insisted on doing everything the hard way.

"Plucking nose hairs," Lister scrunched up his face as he successfully removed a hair, continuing on after the pain had subsided. "Woman have childbirth, and we have this, painful nose hairs. The most painful thing I have ever experienced."

"You'd know wouldn't you Listy, you've done both," Arnold teased from the doorway before deciding to come into the room.

The twins weren't mentioned much. Jim and Bexley were still a sore point for them both. They couldn't help wondering how things would've turned out if the boys had been normal and healthy, without weird ageing issues that resulted of being from two dimensions.

"I wonder how Deb and Arlene are coping with the boys?" Dave asked. Both silent for a moment, neither wanting to dwell on the painful subject.

Arnold moved the conversation back to common, comfortable grounds for them both. "Listy, Listy, Listy," Rimmer tutted. "What would the ladies think if they saw you in that monstrosity?" Teasing Dave for his choice in clothing.

"Hey, it's comfortable man," Dave defended himself, turning back to the mirror and attacking his nose hairs once again. "Not like there are any ladies around to see me. Anyone else other than the four of us for that matter. You're the only one that actually cares what I wear. Cat likes me looking worse than him, and Kryten's happy when I wear clothes that he's washed for me."

Arnold tried to pretend that he didn't care about what Dave wore, but the simple fact was he did care. He liked everyone to look presentable at least. Taking a seat, Arnold opened up the book he had about holograms. If he was going to be fixing holograms for Wildfire, he was going to make certain he knew everything about them. It was a nice change of pace from his astronavigation books and his engineering books. From being a hologram himself for years, he found that he knew most of what the book was talking about. It was so refreshing reading a book he understood. He actually felt relaxed while he was reading instead of the normal stress he experienced while reading.

"I wouldn't do that if I was you," Arnold warned in a teasing tone, noticing what Dave was trying to do now that he'd finished plucking his nose hairs. He'd broken the cap off his tooth earlier that day and had glued it back with wood glue instead of getting Kryten to put the cap back in properly.

"Smeg off Rimmer," Dave said, ignoring the warning as he proceeded to try and floss his teeth, only to find that he couldn't pull the floss free, it was now stuck between his tooth and his tooth cap.

In a sing-song voice, Arnold teased. "Told you so." Before going back to his reading, not helping with the floss.

\- Red Dwarf -

Dave had been unsuccessful at removing the floss or finding anything to cut the floss. It was now hanging from his mouth out. The floss insisted on being stuck in his mouth and impossible to break. Arnold was ignoring Dave as he fumbled about the room and Kryten who'd come in to clean, the droid was also admiring how good the dressing gown looked on Dave. The droid was also no help in getting the floss removed.

They all looked up when Cat entered the room. "Hey guys, I found a weird thing with a capital wee, it's heading straight for us."

Being Cat language, that could've been anything. Something dangerous or something friendly or nothing at all. It could be actual wee for all they knew. Dave was asking for more information from the Cat, not getting anywhere with deciphering what the Cat was saying.

"Is it a wibbly thing or a swirly thing, sir?" Kryten asked, attempting to get closer to finding out what the Cat sensed coming towards them.

"I wouldn't want to commit at this stage and look like a fool," Cat exclaimed, getting more eye rolls from Arnold. "Come see for yourself."

Which is what they should've been doing for a start, reading from the console what was coming towards them instead of getting Cat to try and translate for them. While it was easier to understand Cat now then it had been a few years ago, it was still hard at times to understand him.

"What have we got?" Arnold asked, not understanding what was on the console just yet.

"It's an anomaly in space, and it's coming directly for us sirs," Kryten explained.

Arnold didn't like what his console was telling him now that he knew where in space he was looking. It was an anomaly alright, one that was big and fast and coming directly towards them like Kryten said. They could not outrun it. Arnold was a master at running away from things and knew when something could not be outrun.

"I'm going to outrun it," Cat exclaimed what Arnold already knew what was impossible

Arnold stood to his feet. "You have fun with that. I'm going next door, to hide under the table, because we are not outrunning that thing, whatever it is. Too-da-loo."

The other's didn't even turn when Arnold did exactly what he said. They didn't even call him a coward today, even if that was what he was. The anomaly read a little bit like Ace's dimension-jumping ship whenever they had an encounter with it, just not the same as the previous times they had anything to do with Ace. If it was Ace coming to get a light-bee repair, well he had another thing coming because he was not in a state to fix holograms at the moment. If the anomaly destroyed the ship, sitting under a table was not going to save him any more than being in the cockpit would.

It was a rough several moments, as the ship shook and turned. Arnold's head coming through the table on more than one occasion as he subconsciously put himself into soft-light mode. As quickly as the roughness started, everything stopped.

Arnold stayed put for a few moments, "is it over?" He shouted at the rest of the crew as they left the cockpit.

"There is a disturbance with space-time in the engine room sir. We are going down to check it out." Kryten replied.

\- Red Dwarf -

They arrived in the engine room deck, there was something big blue and shiny in the engine room.

"What is that thing?" Arnold asked, most concerned if it was dangerous or not.

"It's a dimensional rift sir, to a parallel dimension," Kryten explained.

"So I was right when I thought that the bumpy ride felt similar to Ace coming into our dimension?" Arnold asked, wondering if this rift that they'd come across had been left by Ace. He'd been in the dimension just recently. Maybe jumping between dimensions left some type of damage?

"No way you thought that," Dave replied with an eye roll. No one believed him, even when he really was telling the truth. Arnold didn't argue the point. He was focusing on the fact there was a dimensional rift that was giving access directly to the ship. It probably chose this area to break through because of the enlarged cargo bay from when they'd broken the time stream by killing their future selves. It was close to the area that was affected the most.

"Let's have a goosy." Dave walked into the dimension rift without any protective gear. He didn't even know if there was oxygen on the other side. He was always so reckless. And Holly expected Arnold to keep that thing safe and sane? He was failing at his job.

"Are you mad?" Arnold shouted. Certain the answer to that question was yes. "You don't even know what is in that thing. It could kill you, or you could get trapped in another dimension, separated from me forever."

"Separated from you?" Cat asked, "why didn't you say so." He then rushed after Dave through the rift.

Kryten following after the pair making sure they both got through safely. Arnold paced in front of the rift, glaring at it, waiting for the others to return. He'd followed them down here because he didn't want to be alone and didn't want to be wondering what was happening and here he was doing exactly that. Taking a deep breath that wasn't needed, he took a step through the rift.

Arnold gulped nervously as he got a look at the blue tunnel that seemed to go on forever. He couldn't hear or see the others. He looked at a hole above him in the tunnel that just had black nothingness behind it. Not wanting to be alone, Arnold followed the rest of the crew. He didn't want to be alone. He'd just spend the entire time imagining the worst of the worst things happening. Those seconds of not knowing what was happening were horrible. Arnold could not handle five minutes on Starbug alone, how was Wildfire going to have him as Ace? He wasn't going to last five minutes in his first real battle if he accepted being Ace. He was glad that he turned the Ace offer down. Or what happens if this weird anomaly was Ace's way of getting him the light-bees and all the parts he would need to repair the holograms?

Walking slowly and carefully through the tunnel, not wanting to fall into a hole that entered non-space he hoped that the tunnel hadn't broken off and wasn't leading him to a different location to the location of the others. Looking back at the entrance he gulped. The tunnel seemed to be destabilising slightly.

Relief flooded through him when he finally heard Dave, Kryten and the other's talking. They were talking to another version of themselves. Kryten from the other dimension was gold in colour and better maintained to their own Kryten. Cat looked very much the same but wearing a different suit, thank God, they didn't have to listen to Cat complaining about being caught in the same outfit as someone else, even if that someone else was another version of him. The most intriguing of the group was a clean cut version of Dave. A Dave Lister who was a hologram which must mean that the final version of the group must be himself! A version of himself that had lived and was not Ace. He and Kryten might actually be friends in that universe because he was alive so Kryten had to respect him. It would only make sense that Holly would turn Dave on to keep another Arnold sane after all, Dave was the only one below him in rank that he had any authority over.

The excitement was immediately crushed when he saw that the living survivor of the Red Dwarf was not another version of himself, it was Kristine smegging Kochanski, the smegging Console Officer whom Dave had a crush on from the first moment he joined the crew. The woman who always made Rimmer sound like scum, something Arnold to this day still did not know how she did. Was probably the Scottish accent.

Arnold let out a heavy sigh, Dave was never going to get over his crush on Kristine, knowing that he'd been brought back to keep her sane, even if it was in another dimension. This Kristine was also a lot cleaner cut then the Kristine that he'd known. Looking like she did now, Arnold found her almost attractive. He tried to shake the feeling away, it was probably because she was the first woman he'd seen since - it had been a while but he believed it was the alternate versions himself and Dave from the parallel dimension.

"Remember coming back from shore leave on Mimas?" Holo-Dave asked Dave. None of them had noticed him or Kochanski yet, though he and Kochanski were eyeing one another off as they walked closer to the group.

"Yeah, that was a fun trip. Rimmer started a bar brawl, and on the way back to the ship." Dave smiled.

"So you didn't find Frankenstein?" Dave asked.

"I found Frankie, felt sorry for her. She was so helpless looking, so I get her vaccinated, where I found out she was expecting kittens and took her back to the ship planning to raise her and her kitten on Fiji when I had enough money." Dave replied, reminiscing about his mangy pregnant cat that he'd brought back. The one that Arnold knew about, but never said anything about. Why? He still didn't know.

"Frankenstein in my dimension was a kitten," Holo-Dave replied.

"Then where did all the cat babies come from to create Cat?" Dave asked the question that Arnold had been wondering himself.

"I'm not the only person to smuggle a cat on board," Holo-Dave replied, going into a story about how he'd gone to the planet to intentionally find a cat to get himself thrown into stasis after breaking up with Kristine. "Krissy found the cat when I got back to the ship. She didn't have the heart to destroy her and got thrown in stasis instead."

Dave looked like Christmas had come when his attention was drawn to Kristine who'd finally joined the group. He spent a few moments trying to pull the floss from his teeth.

"Listy, Listy, Listy what would the ladies think if they saw you in that monstrosity?" Arnold repeated the question from earlier. "You didn't care before, but you obviously do now. Kochanski and Lister never dated in our dimension," Arnold said from behind Dave, drawing everyone's attention to him.

Dave gave him a knowing look, knowing that he would've followed eventually and wouldn't want to be left alone. It took a lot of effort not to cling to Dave, he was still terrified that something was going to happen that would cause them to be separated from one another.

Holo-Dave looked intrigued by Arnold, while Kristine still had a surprised look from when she'd first seen him.

Holo-Dave turned to Dave. "Rimmer was brought back to keep you sane? How does that work? Does he keep you sane by driving you insane? Makes me glad to be the dead one and not stuck in your living hell."

"Rimmer's not that bad once you get to really know him," Dave said in reply. Arnold was surprised.

"What are you suffering from, Stockholm syndrome or something?" Holo-Dave asked with a laugh.

Kryten turned to Dave in a way that suggested he was about to start listing every one of Arnold's bad qualities. "Not that bad, are you forgetting it was only earlier today that he went and cowered underneath the table to hide from the dimensional rift before we knew what it was. And-"

Cat cut Kryten off before Kryten could list off more bad qualities. "Are we talking about the same Goal Post head?"

"Maybe I should have left when Ace gave me the chance," Arnold pouted. "Clearly I am not appreciated here."

"Kristine, you look great," Dave complimented, ignoring Arnold's self-pity.

"You look pretty amazing yourself," Kristine's suggested sarcastically. Arnold was surprised to hear a posh English accent that sounded almost Ionian and not the Scottish accent he was used to. "We've come to trade."

"We don't have much supply wise that we can trade," Arnold replied. Which was true, they were low on everything.

"Information perhaps?" She sounded doubtful that they'd have any worthwhile information when she made the request.

"I have records of everything that has happened to us since arriving in deep space," Arnold answered, trying to prove to the snooty officer that they did have something that was worthwhile trading for. "Including all the information from a parallel dimension that we visited that was the same in every way, except that everyone's genders were reversed in that dimension."

Kristine immediately dismissed Arnold's offer for information, writing off his records as useless before she'd even looked at them. Something that the officers had been doing all his working life. "There is something you could do for us." She turned her attention back to Dave. "I want to have children one day." Dave was getting excited at the prospect of having sex with Kristine to give her those children. Arnold smirked when it hit Dave that all Kristine wanted was a sperm donation.

\- Red Dwarf -

The two groups of four were standing in the tunnel to say a final goodbye after supplies were traded. Arnold was hoping to prove Kristine wrong with the information he'd exchanged with them with his knowledge on hologram repairs, other dimensions and some of the other adventures they'd had over the years.

"Wish we could spend more time chatting," Holo-Dave said to the group. "You especially, Rimmer. It's nice to see after all this time that you're still the same smeghead that was my shift leader. You made me realise that I miss you a heap, man."

Arnold looked at his own Dave helplessly and confused as Holo-Dave hugged him. He didn't know what to do or what he did to deserve the hug. Awkwardly he placed his arms around the other man. Giving him a hug.

The hug was broken by an explosion and the tunnel destabilising. Arnold was pushed away by Holo-Dave.

Both Dave's calling out for Kristine as the blast ripped a while between them. Arnold jumped the gap that was between himself and his own group. He was not getting trapped in a strange dimension or no dimension. A yelp was heard from Dave as Kristine had managed to grab onto his floss, keeping Kristine on their side of the growing dimensional rift. Arnold gulped. If he had hesitated to jump, he would've been stuck in the other dimension with the clean-cut holo-Dave, Kryten and Cat. On second thought that was more tempting than his ragtag team. He could just not abandon them for better versions, no matter how tempting. This ragtag team was his family.

Arnold held onto Dave, keeping him from toppling into the hole after Kristine, kneeling over the edge, feeling dizzy at the non-space below them. Trying to ignore his natural survival instincts to abandon everyone and get back to the ship as quickly as possible. Trying to stay conscious as he leaned over the hole. He would topple them all in if he fainted now.

Arnold leant over the edge of the hole, leaning down, grabbing tightly onto Kristine's outreaching hand, pulling her up easily, overestimating the strength that he now had as a hard-light hologram as he pulled the woman up. Keeping hold of her as she called out for her own Dave, trying to jump the holes between dimensions.

"Dave," Kristine help her hands out, calling for her lover. Arnold not letting go despite her struggle. "Let me go, I need to get back to my Dave."

"It's too dangerous, you can't jump that. You'll die," Arnold scolded her. He had a high sense of self-preservation, he knew that the gap was now impossible to jump.

"Kris, it's too dangerous. Stay with Rimmer and the other me. I'll find a way back to you eventually. Stay safe. I love you." Holo-Dave called out to his girlfriend.

"Love you forever," Kristine called over the growing rift. Arnold carried her back to their side of the dimensional rift before it closed them in for good.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold only put Kristine down once the dimensional rift was fully closed, which took just under an hour. She kicked and screamed the entire time, wanting to go through and find a way home. It was only when the rift entirely closed that she noticed their current location.

"This isn't the Red Dwarf. Where is it?" Kristine yelled at them, still upset and frustrated at getting stuck in another dimension. They hadn't gone into each other's dimension while transferring supplies.

"We sort of lost Red Dwarf," Dave sheepishly admitted.

Kristine screamed at them. "How can you lose a ship as big as the Red Dwarf. It's big, its red and the size of a small moon? How do you lose a moon-sized ship?"

Both men shrugged. Cat had abandoned them long ago not wanting to put up with the banshee screaming.

"You mean that I am stuck here with Pricilla, Queen of the Space Junk, a noxious waste of resources that should've never been turned on in the first place and two cheap copies of my other friends. There is no way I am staying here with you lot in this hunk of junk. We need to get the link way back." Kristine insulted the crew. Arnold was just happy that he wasn't the first one that she'd insulted.

"I know that you don't like being stuck with us. We don't like being stuck with you, either," Arnold crossed his arms suspecting that he was the only one that didn't like being stuck with her. He knew that Dave never wanted her to go back, Cat would warm up to her now that she wasn't screaming because she was a woman and Kryten would be happy about cleaning up after another person. "We need to try and make the best out of a bad situation. I don't know how long you will be stuck with us. Until you return, you can have my room, and I'll go back to sharing with Listy here. You should have a lie-down, it's been a long day for you."

"I'm going home to my own dimension, today. I don't need a bedroom," Kristine insisted. Sitting in front of the spot that the portal had been.

"Kris, Rimmer's right, you need to rest," Dave agreed. "I know that you want to go back to your own dimension, but that isn't going to happen while you're this exhausted."

Kristine came up with the next excuse. "It's Kochanski to you, we don't know each other. You are not my Dave. I wouldn't want to impose."

Dave tried to hide his hurt expression to Kristine's hostile tone to his name. "And you wouldn't be imposing, Rimmer spends nearly all his time in my room anyway. We shared a room on the Red Dwarf, sharing again is not going to be a problem."

"I'll even move all my stuff out now and remake the bed, so you have fresh sheets," Arnold headed towards the bunk, sensing that seeing a familiar face was hurting Kristine. Arnold turned to Dave, hoping that you would listen for once. "You should head to the cockpit and see if Cat can sniff out any more of those dimensional rifts."

Dave gave them a weak smile. "Yeah, I'll do that. Kris I mean Kochanski, I'll be in the cockpit if you need anything. It's just at the end of this hallway."

"Not like it will be hard to find with how small the ship is. Lister," Kristine stopped him in his tracks. "Thank you, I know you are just trying to help. I just need some time to myself, let everything sink in."

Arnold picked a box up on the way to his room so he could begin moving things right away. The first thing he did was strip and remake the bed. He knew that Kryten would get upset about missing out on the chore, but he at least had sheets to wash, dry and iron. Arnold would not take that away from Kryten.

"I know it's not much, and the pipes squeak. I just turn my hearing off when it gets too bad. Kryten knows how to rouse me when I do that. We'll try to find a way to fix the pipes if it gets too much for you." Arnold got nervous before he mentioned the next thing, that he hoped would not be out of line. "Miss Kochanski ma'am. I don't know how long you will be here for, but if it ends up being long term." He was turning bright red unable to keep the squeak out of his voice. "There are sanitary pads still in the medi-bay, hidden in the back corner of the cabinet on the far right. We never bothered removing them when we took Starbug over as our own, and they've been useful as a last resort when Lister's been injured, and we've run out of bandages."

Arnold turned away, not believing that he'd managed to tell her. He hoped that she didn't ask him to repeat that information. He could not trust Dave to remember that it was an item that Kristine would need and Cat was not human and who knew if woman's hygiene needs were still in Kryten's database or not.

"Do you know how many month's worth of supplies I have?" Kristine asked, slightly amused and slightly worried about low supply. "I never had to be concerned about supply on the Red Dwarf. Being the only woman, I have enough to last me several lifetimes with all the vending machines, woman's quarters and the medi-bays."

"I think we've got three months worth not sure how much you will use so that is a guess. And if your Red Dwarf is anything like our you'd also have a full cargo bay," Arnold added.

"With just me, I had no reason to touch that supply. How do you even know that?" Kochanski asked. Arnold thought it might be intrigue and not disgust.

"I inventoried everything on the ship, and when I say everything, I mean everything. That includes all sanitary items, condoms, other methods of birth control, pregnancy testers. There were a number that was not accounted for that I think we're getting stolen by the crew that worked down there."

The bed was made, and he had everything of his in the box. "I should have everything." Arnold stood to his feet with the box in hand. "If you need anything..." He said awkwardly before heading towards the exit for his former room.

"Arnold, thank you," Kristine said. "I know that it must have been hard for you to mention."

"We'll never talk about this again. If you end up staying with us long term, I'll make sure to add that to items that we take from the derelicts we raid." Mentioning what he just said he'd never mention.

As he left, he had a slight spring in his step, feeling a little happy that Kristine used his first name before she'd used Dave's first name.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

Arnold didn't mind sharing a room with Dave again. He'd grown used to it on the Red Dwarf, actually missed it on Starbug but had been too much of a coward to bring anything up. He didn't want the others to know how much he hated being in a room on his own, how lonely he felt when he was alone, how scared every noise would make him when he was tired.

He added more of a personal touch to his side of the room then his lonesome room had ever got. Hanging up freshly made posters. A timetable for learning about holograms that as recently made and his books. His clothing put away in the cupboard, dumping everything of Dave's out to be sorted by Kryten.

"Why do you still have that no smoking sign?" Dave asked noticing that it had also gone up on the wall. "I don't even smoke anymore."

"Because it's mine. The only reason you don't smoke anymore is because I flushed all your cigarettes into deep space to force you to quit cold turkey and we haven't found anything since." Arnold said, proud and happy that Dave didn't pick up the habit again after the twins were born. That felt like a lifetime ago now. He noticed Dave's hand linger on the caesarean scar from long ago, knowing that was what had caused him to quit and must have been his reminder for why he quit.

The ship was rocked by a nearby explosion. Both men shared a glance before running to the cockpit where Kryten and Cat were already seated. Kristine was not far behind. Arnold was looking at his consol recognising the ships name immediately. "Oh Listy, your wife found us." Arnold teased, trying to remain calm. He flinched as Kristine put a hand on his shoulder, leaning over him to get a good look at the console.

"Sorry, just you're in what is normally my seat when I'm manning the console in Starbug," Kristine apologised.

Arnold gulped wishing she wouldn't stand so close. "Well, you'll find that this is my job."

"Oh God, it really is the missus," Dave complained after getting the scan that Kryten had put on the monitor of the GELF that was tracking and firing at them.

"That what? I thought Arnold was only joking when he said she was your wife," Kristine said.

"Oh no not joking in the slightest, that had a really good story behind it." Arnold happily told the officer the story of landing on the planet, needing parts for Starbug and Dave reluctantly leaving his GELF bride on their wedding day after they'd got the parts they needed. "Needless to say, she wasn't happy being stood up like that and has been following us ever since."

"Do you get stalked like this by orang-utans at the London Zoo?" Kristine asked Dave.

"I like her, can we keep her?" Arnold smiled in Kristine's direction, hoping that it wasn't to forward. He was surprised to see Kryten looked horrified at the prospect of keeping Kristine forever. It wasn't often that he came across someone that had a similar sense of humour to his own and to find that in Kristine Kochankis of all people was just a delightful surprise and highly unexpected.

Kristine was leaning over Arnold's shoulder again, reaching over him to press the buttons on her console, while Kryten was translating the GELFs message for Dave. They wanted Dave handed over to them. His GELF bride wanted him, and if she couldn't have Dave, then no one could have Dave.

"Okay, this has gone on long enough. Patch me into the MCN and lay down and SS line," Kristine instructed the miss fit crew.

Dave turned, looking at Arnold who just shrugged. He didn't have a clue what she just said. Kristine looked at the crew like they were crazy for not understanding her, reading out a whole heap of numbers that were making Arnold's head spin. "Now just follow those cords?"

"Cords what now?" Cat turned around, looking rather confused. Dave shrugged still not knowing what Kristine said.

Arnold knew what she wanted this time, only because he was looking at the console himself. "She wants you to head towards the blue star." Numbers may be his weakness, but he could read his console in his sleep.

"Well, why didn't she so?" Cat exclaimed, moving the ship in the directions Arnold had pointed out.

"Need to keep to simple terms or these goits don't understand," Arnold replied smugly.

Dave turned around. "Hey, you don't understand what she is saying either. You're just reading off the console."

Arnold tried to push back a nervous gulp because what Dave said was true. Kristine was speaking another language as far as he was concerned and he never did get the hang of other languages.

Kristine continued reading out directions that Arnold would repeat so Cat and Dave could both understand.

Kristine put her hands up in frustration, slamming them on the console. They were safe and had survived another day. "How is it that you are still alive? This is basic astronavigation. You should know the correct terms when relaying information and flying the ship."

"I was taught how to fly by Mister Rimmer," Kryten replied, trying to shift the blame to the hologram for his so-called poor performance. "Everything I learnt about flying and navigating I learnt from him."

"Considering I was still a soft-light hologram at the time, I didn't do a bad job," Arnold said, still proud of the fact that he'd successfully taught Kryten to fly. "Both Kryten and myself have licences handed out by the Space Corps. Listy here has no interest in getting his licence or learning the first thing about astronavigation and Cat, well he's a Cat."

Dave turned around, standing up from his console. "And we all know that Rimmer constantly fails any exams he takes. I'm surprised that he managed to get his licence. We haven't been doing too badly for a bunch of uneducated slime."

"Not too badly?" Kristine shrieked. "You lost your Red Dwarf with no idea where to go, and you got me trapped in your dimension, and you're only surviving by the skin of your teeth. If it weren't for me just now, you'd all be dead."

"No. We would not be dead," Arnold insisted. His survival instincts were rather high. If they had been at the risk of dying during that encounter, he would've been under the table in the next room.

"He has a point, if Rimmer though we were going to die, this coward would've gone into hiding, like all the other times we almost died." Dave corrected.

Arnold closed his eyes, it was true, but he still hated hearing it aloud from those around him.

Kristine huffed in frustration, leaving the men in the drive room.

"Are all women like that?" Cat asked. "Bitchy and whiney like Rimmer?"

"Nah, not all the time. She'll settle down once she gets used to us." Dave said, just happy to have a real woman on board once again.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold leant back on the spare bunk in Dave's room, trying to remind himself that this was now his room as well. He didn't mind Kristine taking over his room, he never liked it in the first place, but he did hate that Kristine was taking over his console and his favourite food that Dave and Cat didn't like, leaving him on holographic food that tasted bland and didn't leave him satisfied.

Kryten was in their room ironing. Ironing Arnold's uniforms since they had been moved, so they needed to be re-ironed according to sanitation droid logic.

"All she does is talk about her, Dave. She keeps moving the salad cream." Kryten complained about everything that he didn't like about Kristine, not even keeping it a secret that he didn't like the woman. To Arnold it was refreshing, he'd never heard the droid hate anyone before, not even him even though he knew Kryten hated him.

Kryten's pitch continued rising. "I took her a glass of milk when she was showering. I've seen her naked." Sounding crushed at seeing the only woman on the ship, possibly in the universe, naked.

Arnold sat up, putting his book down. "What does she look like?" He asked before his brain had a chance to catch up. He cursed himself, he was meant to be the gentleman of the group, he shouldn't be asking perverted questions like that. It was a slow day, and they would all take any form of new entertainment and at the moment that was Kristine.

Dave had leant in, to listen in anticipation of Kryten's reply.

"She's got all those in and out bits that Mister Lister likes," Kryten replied in a high squeak that suggested he was very upset about that fact.

Both Arnold and Dave sat back, disappointed with the response. Of course, Arnold should've expected that type of response.

Kryten turned to Lister. "You're going to end up liking her more than me."

Dave looked back at Kryten, all defensive. "No, I'm not. I'll always like you more than her."

"He has a point, Listy," Arnold had to add, it was an observation he'd noticed over the years even before the crew was wiped out. "You met me first, and you like me the least out of everyone here, everyone we've ever met. The next person is Cat, he's above me on the list but below Kryten. You met Kryten after Cat, and you like him more than myself and Cat. So following your pattern, you will like Miss Kochanski the most since you have just met her thus liking her more than Kryten, the Cat and myself.

"See, even Mister Rimmer can see it," Kryten agreed.

Dave turned, hissing in Arnold's direction. "Not helping Rimmer." He turned back to Kryten. "I'll always like you the best. Kris could never replace you, I promise."

Arnold stopped listening, going back to his book as Kryten asked Dave a whole string of questions and listed off scenarios where it was obvious that in reality, Dave would choose Kristine over the droid. Who in their right mind would choose folding sheets over spending time with a naked attractive single woman? Not that Kristine was exactly single, but she was highly attractive. Arnold didn't even bother contradicting Dave, he'd had enough of the crying mechanoid who could see through the lies.

"Why can't Miss Kochanski be more like Mister Rimmer. He didn't have any in or out bits, hardly at all."

"Leave me out of this, and what do you mean hardly at all? I don't have any in or out bits. I look nothing like a woman." Arnold screeched.

Kryten chirped, "But you're perfect. You have womanly like hips and legs Mister Rimmer, sir."

Arnold glared at the droid, this was not the first time he had been told he had legs and hips like a woman. Kryten ignored the glares he was getting from Arnold as Dave was smirking about the comments.

"I'm going to end up alone again, like I did on the Nova 5." Kryten continued his whining.

Arnold had no clue how Kristine being around equalled being alone again.

"You killed the crew," Dave said rather bluntly.

Arnold put his book down, "Why do we let a droid who killed his crew on our ship?"

"You also killed the crew? Why do we leave you turned on?" Dave added.

"That was an accident," Arnold whined. He still felt guilty that it was the drive plate he didn't repair correctly that had ended up killing the entire crew of the Red Dwarf, including himself. He needed to ask Kristine if the accident had happened the same way in her dimension, with Dave around he should've been there to help him with the drive plate.

"So was Kryten killing the Nova 5," Dave stated the fact that Arnold already knew and had known for years.

"What about the SS Augusta, I ended up alone there as well?" Kryten pointed out. His first crew and posting.

"They all died of old age," Lister reminded Kryten.

"And if everything goes well here, Lister and Cat will both die of old age," Arnold said, hoping that was the way both would end up going.

"You see, I'm going to end up alone." Kryten sobbed.

"You'll never end up alone again, you'll still have Rimmer when Cat and I both die," Dave said, trying to put the droid at ease.

"You know what, I may end up taking Ace's offer to be Ace after you and Cat both die. Spending the rest of eternity with only Kryten does not sound very appealing." Arnold said now seeing what Ace had meant. Thinking about an eternity with Kryten was not appealing, yet he was okay with an eternity with Holly when Holly had originally turned him on.

That didn't help Kryten's mood, who ended up storming out the room.

"It's nice," Arnold smiled to himself.

"What is possibly nice right now?" Dave asked, looking at him like he was insane.

"Kryten has found someone that he dislikes more than me. I know it's not going to last. Once Kristine's been around for a while, I'll go back to being the most disliked person. But for the first time in my entire life-existence, I am not the most hated person around. I'm going to enjoy it while I can."

\- Red Dwarf -

To keep Dave busy and out of Kristine's way, Arnold had taken him down to the cargo bay to help catalogue the items they'd received from Kristine's dimension. He knew that Dave always hated this task and would whine and complain each time had to do such a boring task. He hadn't even noticed Dave had stopped moving until Dave spoke.

"It wasn't our Rob O Ros, it was ouroboros," Dave said in complete and utter fascination.

"Of course it says ouroboros what type of gimboid think the batteries are called our Rob O Ros," Arnold snapped.

"No, not the battery name, the message that was written on the side of me box," Dave replied.

"The one you were found in under a pool table when you were six weeks old?" Arnold asked. It had been a long time since that story had been mentioned.

"Yeah, Gran told me that they thought my parents couldn't decide if they wanted to name me Rob or Ross."

"You don't look like a Robert or a Ross," Arnold replied.

"Gran said the same thing which is why she got dad to name me David," Dave replied. "I know who my parents are."

"Since when? The last time you mentioned this to me you had no clue who your parents are."

"Since just now," Dave pointed to the box. "Don't you see, I know who I am now. I understand. You know the in vitro tube that Kris gave me to put my sperm into, the frozen embryo. It's me. At some point, after the baby is born, we time travel to the past and leave me under a pool table. We wrote Our Rob or Ros on the box to explain. To complete a circle of humanity that will never truly end. Actually, I've seen a photo of my box, and I'm convinced that it's your handwriting. I'm me own father and Kris is me, mum."

Arnold had heard some crazy things since he came into deep space. He found himself believing Dave. "Oh, that explains so much. I told you that you were an incest baby. I thought your parents were brother and sister. It was actually much much better." Arnold rubbed his hands together. "Instead it's mother and son. Probably mother and grandfather and so on going on and on. I thought your family tree was nuts before with you and your female self being the twins parents but this just gets better and better. I bet Deborah is her own mother or father or however it works in that dimension."

"I have to tell her," Dave stood up.

"And tell Kristine what exactly? She's not going to believe you." Arnold asked.

"Believe what?" Kristine asked from the doorway.

"Miss Kochanski," Arnold greeted. "Didn't see you. Listy here thinks that the foetus in the in vitro tube is him."

Dave glared at Arnold for sharing the news so bluntly. Arnold didn't know how Dave was going to tell her, he'd be all wishy-washy and take forever to get to the point or tell it in a long-winded way that didn't make any sense.

"Seriously, what were you going to tell me?" Kristine asked.

"That, after I went and found the photo of me box to see if it is really Rimmer's handwriting on the side of the box," Dave replied, walking to the back towards his room, access the computer console that they didn't use much to pull up the photo's that had been duplicated onto Starbug.

It didn't take long for Dave to find the photo he was looking for. His first photo that showed him in the box on top of the pool table he'd been found under. They could clearly see the handwriting on the side that was unmistakable as Arnolds.

"I don't understand how this is even possible. Why would we send a baby to the past to grow up as you?" Arnold asked.

"A time loop that humanity never truly ends. Because there is going to be a me who is abandoned to grow up and have me who will abandon me for the me to grow up and continue the circle so the human race will never truly go extinct." Dave explained in his weird logic that gave Arnold a headache.

"If the embryo is really Dave, how do we get him to the past? I don't know about you lot, but I have never come across any means of time travel." Kristine asked.

"We've come across time travel a few times," Arnold replied, wondering how much he should share with her before he may as well tell her everything if she was going to stick around. "Once on the Red Dwarf, there was a stasis leak that went back in time three weeks before the accident. I was soft-light at the time and could not exist off of Red Dwarf without assistance. No idea why Lister and Cat didn't choose to remain in the past because they could have left the ship.

"Then there was the time we had photo fluid that had mutated causing the developed photos to send up back to the past but only within the frame of the picture.

"And then there was the time that we met our future selves and had to kill them before they killed us to prevent us from becoming them. Listy was a brain in a jar, I was fat which I still have no idea how that was possible being a hologram and all. Cat was balding, and Kryten had an ugly wig a suit.

"Then the last time we time travelled we caused this weird time paradox where we caused Kennedy to assassinate himself. We almost broke history at least twice with all the time travelling we've done." Arnold finished the abbreviated version of their time travel journeys.

"We did break history, whenever I try to explain killing our future selves to a camera, it melts," Dave added. "If I don't end up in that bar, we are going to wreak history." Arnold reminded Dave.

"But the other versions of us ended up addicted to time travel. We promised that we were not going to time travel again because we don't want to end up like them."

"And that isn't going to happen to us. We'll only time travel one more time, to drop me off and then we'll never time travel again."

"You say one more time now, but what about the first time when we time travelled to the past when we saw older versions of ourselves, your older self married to Miss Kochanksi." Rimmer turned to Kristine. "Not you Miss Kochanski, the Miss Kochanski from our own timeline. No wonder why the me from the future said everything is going to get confusing. You're going to marry an alternate version of your mother. I like how your family tree makes mine look normal."

"Your father probably isn't even your father. From the stories that you told me I wouldn't be surprised if your uncles is your father." Dave had to add.

"I'm pretty sure that Uncle Frank is my brother Franks father. Uncle Frank and mother are not related by blood unlike you and Miss Kochanski if what you think ends up being true. I think I was father's only biological son, I think that is why I was such a big disappointment to him. His only biological child and I could not do anything right or follow the path that he had mapped out for me."

"So we have two reasons to time travel, take baby me to the past and marry Kris, saving her from the radiation leak and then we will never time travel ever again."

"We can't bring another Miss Kochanski here. The space is too cramped, and we don't have enough supplies as it is." Arnold reminded Dave. They didn't have the supplies for the crew they did have.

Dave amended his plan. "We drop the baby off in the past, find the Red Dwarf, and once we have it, we go to the past and get Kris. I do have one question, how do we time travel? We destroyed the time machine after the whole Kennedy incident."

"Ace, next time he comes to visit we ask him to take the baby back to the past," Arnold said, remembering his agreement with the dimension hoping version of himself.

"Who is Ace?" Kristine asked, having never heard of Ace Rimmer before.

"He's amazing," Dave gushed, telling Kristine all about the space hero, neglecting to mention one important fact. "We can't be sitting around waiting for Ace, I think we should head back to the derelict and get the time travel paddle."

"No," Arnold insisted. "Are you forgetting the last time we were there we were almost killed. We just keep going around and around in circles."

\- Red Dwarf -

"Sirs, we are never going to find Red Dwarf at this rate," Kryten whined when Dave told him the plan of returning to the derelict. "We already lost time when Mister Ace was sick. The Red Dwarf must be filthy by now with those centuries of not being cleaned. Just imagine all the cleaning that waits for me." Kryten was in mechanoid heaven as he daydreamt about cleaning Red Dwarf.

"It's not like we are going to find another means of time travel anywhere else Krytie," Dave purposely neglected to mention just waiting for Ace and getting him to time travel to the past for them.

"Look, if he doesn't exist I don't exist because Holly will not have any reason to turn my hologram on," Arnold could not believe he was helping Dave. "I don't want to go back to not existing."

"But sir, you would still exist," Kryten said.

"But not like this. I would be dead dead and not a hologram. Cat probably wouldn't exist at all, and you would still be stuck on the Nova 5. The radiation leak would still happen. Holly has no reason to bring me back, Lister never smuggled a cat on board, so Cats ancestors never existed aboard Red Dwarf. There is no reason for Red Dwarf to turn around and you wouldn't be found." Arnold hopped Kryten understood this time.

"It is crucial that we make sure Mister Lister exists. Changing course sirs," Kryten got to plotting a new course on the console back towards what should be certain death.

\- Red Dwarf -

It would take a few days to get to the simulant ship that had the time travel machine the crew was looking for, and Kristine was in the boy's room looking for another outfit to wear when she put her one in the wash. She'd already given up on Dave's wardrobe, it was all grimy even with Kryten cleaning everything. Arnold watched as she opened his wardrobe.

"What's this?" She said as she held out the freshly laundered outfit. "It's hideous."

"It's my uniform. What is so hideous about it? Everything is just as well maintained as before the accident, better even because I don't have to unblock chicken soup nozzles anymore." Arnold was wondering if Kryten had done something when he washes the uniforms while upset about Kristine.

"Our dimensions must be more different than I first assumed." Kristine was already standing at the mirror to activate the computer screen, pulling up some of the data she'd traded from her own dimension. It was a picture of the Arnold Rimmer from her dimension.

"His uniform is blue," Arnold said knowing he never wore an outfit like that one.

"That's correct, our uniforms are different," Kristine said.

Kristine's records after the accident hadn't been as extensive as Arnolds. He recorded everything twice. The first version was what actually happened and the second was an embellished version which showed himself in a better light. The version that Dave and Kryten had access to. The embellished version because Arnold knew that Dave would get bored reading real records and reports. Arnold did his best to encourage Dave to read without Dave realising what Arnold was doing.

Kristine ended up taking his uniform to wear. After she was changed the continued comparing more records that they'd both recorded and seeing how different the crew between the two dimensions was.

"Did you ever end up in a reverse gender dimension like we did?" Arnold asked, bringing up the staff files from Deb and Arlene and the male version of Kristine.

"No, that would have been interesting, I wish we had," Kristine said as she got the crew files to merge so they could see crew pictures from all three dimensions as they clicked through them.

"Their experiences were identical until we met," Arnold smiled sadly as he thought of the twin boys that changed the two dimensions.

"Do you think a male version of me is trapped with them right now?" Kristine asked.

"Maybe, there was something that caused our dimensions to no longer being the same, but you getting stuck may still happen."

Kristine didn't pry what that something had been to cause the dimensions to differ which Arnold was glad for. That was Dave's story to tell. If he wanted Kristine to know about the boys he would be the one to tell the story.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

It was several days into their journey back to the derelict that held the time travel device. The very same device that they had purposely left behind so they didn't have the temptation to time travel again.

"This is a bad idea, I just know this is a bad idea," Arnold paced the drive room. "What happens if we end up turning into them? I don't want to be them. We should turn around and try to find Red Dwarf's trail."

None of them wanted to turn into their future selves that were addicted to time travel.

Dave was fanning himself as he tried to cool down. "Will you stop moving! You're making me swelter watching you."

Arnold stopped pacing to glare at Dave. "It's not my fault that I'm dead and cannot feel the heat that is affecting everyone else. I would gladly swap with you. I would love to be feeling the heat right now. Instead, I feel the same nothingness as normal."

The thermostat on the ship had broken down, as a hologram Arnold could not feel the heat that was affecting everyone else. Cat had gone into hiding because the humidity in the ship was messing with his hair and his suits.

"I thought you could feel temperatures since you got your hard-light drive," Dave said.

"While I can feel more than before, I don't feel temperatures," Arnold snapped.

"You're lucky not feeling the heat."

"Oh yes, real lucky to be dead," Arnold spat. "I'm going to bed. Shift is over."

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold held the pillow over his head as Dave complained about how hot it was. About how he wanted a drink and to go to the loo but didn't want to move. This had been going on for hours! He was getting a headache from the constant moaning.

"Will you shut up," Arnold threw his pillow at Dave out of frustration. "I don't need to know about your bladder."

"It's hot man. You're lucky being dead and all and not feeling how hot it is. It's worse now than when we went to bed." Dave whined as he finally got himself out of bed. "I wish I was dead so I didn't have to feel this all night."

"We're flying close to a sun. When we move away you're going to complain we're too cold. You don't want to freeze to death do you?"

"Better than cooking to death."

"Just go pee, have a shower, sleep in the shower for all I care. I don't want to listen to you whine all night."

"But it's so smegging hot." Dave stood up wearing his birthday suit.

"Can you put something on? I know it's hot but do you really have to sleep naked. I don't want to see that every time I roll over."

"Too hot for clothes," Dave grumbled as he walked to the shower down the hallway instead of the one in their room.

Arnold started to drift off as he heard the shower going down the hallway. He was almost asleep when Dave returned from the shower, he was rummaging around the room and grumbling.

"What are you doing?" Arnold grumpily asked.

Dave put his long johns on despite complaining it was too hot for clothes. "To do my laundry to help Kryten out."

"You do laundry?" Arnold sat up looking at his bunkmate in disbelief. "Has this hot weather cooked your brain? You never wash your own laundry. You don't even know how to put your dirty clothes in the laundry basket let alone in the washing machine. You look guilty, what have you done?"

"I'm not guilty. I have nothing to be guilty about." Dave said in a tone that suggested he was totally guilty.

"You've worked out when Kryten washes Miss Kochanski's clothes," Arnold said in an accusing tone. Kryten had taken to hiding Kristine's clothes and washing them at different times because Cat and Dave had been sitting in the laundry room watching her clothing. "You're sick. That is absolutely demeaning. Don't you have any respect for Miss Kochanski at all?" He followed Dave as he walked to the laundry room telling him how wrong he was the entire way.

Cat was already in the laundry room watching Kristine's underwear while eating some popcorn.

"Are we really lacking in entertainment that much that this is a form of entertainment?" Arnold asked staying in the doorway while Dave took a seat next to Cat.

"Look I'm not here to watch Krissy's underwear," Dave exclaimed.

"Look g-string," Cat exclaimed excitedly and pointed towards to washing machine.

Both Arnold and Dave leaning closer to get a better look.

"You missed it, but I swear it was real. It was black and really really small." Cat grinned a toothy grin at them both before looking back to the washing machine.

"I am not here to watch underwear, I am here to stop you both. This is so demeaning. Now get out and go back to bed. This room is the hottest room on the ship. If you want to cool down go to the airlock." Arnold kept insisting but not moving his eyes from the hypnotic spin of the laundry that he would have watched even if he was men's laundry. He used to watch the laundry as a child when he was hiding from the boys at school. He often found watching the spinning more entertaining than TV.

"I'm not watching the woman's laundry, I am to mature for that. I'm here just reading my comic book." Dave got a comic book out from underneath a crate and opened it up but not looking at the page.

Arnold rolled his eyes. "Because that's really mature."

"You're only pretending to be mature." Cat began an immature argument with Dave which eventually got Kryten's attention.

"Sir's what is going on? Why are you in the laundry room in the middle of the night?" Kryten looked between the three men.

"About me being really mature," Dave said.

Arnold was smug as he addressed Kryten, "Lister lost the argument."

"I did not!" Dave had to get the last word before turning to Kryten. "What are you doing here? Laundries not due to finish for a while yet."

"Hiding from Miss Kochanski," Kryten squeaked. "She's throwing knives at the fridge because we don't have any low-fat yoghurts."

Kryten shuffled over to the dryer that still had a few more minutes until it needed to be attended to.

"I was wrong Listy, she's a perfect match for you." Arnold turned from Dave to Kryten. "There has to be more to it then the yoghurt. What did you do?" Arnold accused the mechanoid.

"She's very upset about not being able to sleep, not being able to have a bath, how hot it is, no cottage cheese ... oh dear," Kryten stopped his list of everything that was upsetting Kristine, holding up a shrunken pair of her clothing from the dryer.

Dave and Arnold shared a look before looking back at the shrunken clothing before bolting out, Cat already out the room. The boys ran not wanting to be anywhere near the laundry when Kristine discovered her favourite and only proper outfit had been shrunk.

\- Red Dwarf -

Dave and Arnold had lost Cat in there scramble from the laundry room. They'd avoided Kristine who was in the kitchen reorganizing the cupboards. They'd made it to the cargo bay where they'd found a cool corner.

"The bath thing has got me thinking," Dave said slowly.

"You thinking, you must be sick." Arnold placed a hand on Dave's head like he was checking his temperature and didn't remove it.

Dave noticed the hologram looking more confused than normal and batted away the hand. "Lay off man, I was thinking about how to make Kris feel more settled."

Arnold was now looking at his hand, stunned. "I can feel how hot you are. I can't feel the temperature of anything else but I know that you're thirty seven point three degrees. I can feel how hot you are. You're a bit to warm."

"I already know that I'm a bit warm, don't need you telling me."

"I can't feel any other temperatures. Why can I feel you?" Arnold asked still looking at his hand.

"Don't know," Dave said not really caring. "I was thinking about how to make Kris feel more settled by setting up a bath for her so she can have a proper chance to relax."

Arnold looked up from his hand, composing himself before replying. "Where? The only room big enough is the engine room or the cargo bay and neither location is that relaxing. Or maybe the kitchen but everyone walks through there to get to the cockpit."

"There's our room, it is the biggest quarters on the ship. It's not perfect but it's private and should be more relaxing than here."

"I guess I can sacrifice my room for a short while to keep her happy. I don't want her biting my head off when she finds out I saw her laundry getting washed." Arnold agreed, only because he was sure it was Kristine's time of the month and he knew what his sister in law was like during her time of the month and she was your classic PMS woman you saw in movies and TV shows.

It didn't take them long to find a container in the storage room that was long enough, deep enough for a bath that had never had toxic materials in it. It had previously used for curry powder. The pair managed to wash it out and drag it up to their room without being seen. They filled it up with hot water from the shower, used shower gel which Cat and Dave never used and making the room look nice for Kristine. The bath smelled like curry but it was better than smelling like urine recyc.

"All we need to do is fine Kris before the water goes cold," Dave said impressed with their handiwork.

"Considering how hot it is it might be a good thing. It's strange, I cannot feel the temperature of the water but I know how hot it is, that it is an ideal temperature for most humans." Arnold looked at the water. I never noticed I could sense temperatures before today.

Considering the size of the ship it didn't take long to find Kristine. The only ones that were hard to find were Cat and Arnold when said hologram didn't want to be found.

\- Red Dwarf -

"Hey Kris," Dave greeted, followed closely by Arnold.

Arnold was wide awake now and knew he was never going to get back to sleep. As a hologram, he didn't need the amount of sleep that anyone else needed.

Kristine was sitting on the floor of the kitchen, feeling sorry for herself. "I'm was spoilt, brought up in the trendiest part of Glasko. Eleven years in cyber school with the perfect computer generated friends and perfect CG teachers and the perfect generated settings and now I can't even have a bath."

"Wish I'd gone to cyber school," Arnold took a seat at the kitchen table. "I didn't have any friends. Everyone always picked on me, including the teachers. One of my teachers, when I went to university, was my father and he believed I deserved everything I got and that it was to toughen me up. Didn't work did it. I wasn't allowed to go to cyber school."

"Speaking about a bath, come on, I've gone something to show you," Dave held out a hand to help Kristine up which she ignored standing up without taking his hand.

"You better appreciate it, I sacrificed a lot," Arnold stood up and followed to the bunkroom.

Kristine stood in the doorway staring at the bath in disbelief. "Is that what I think it is? I don't know what to say."

"Thank you would be a start," Arnold said sarcastically.

"Thank you," Kristine turned to them both, looking close to tears. "I really mean it. This is such a sweet thing for both of you to do."

She kissed both of them on the cheek. Arnold was red head to toe and didn't know how to react. The only people that had ever kissed him on the cheek was his grandmothers and other relatives he didn't want anything to do with.

"You can have our quarters tonight. We'll sleep in the unused room with the squeaky pipes. I have a present for you," Dave held out the box. "Found it when I was looking through the creates. I was going to save it for your birthday. I want you to feel at home, you're one of us now."

"Thank you so much," Kristine pulled the dress out, having a good look before seeing it wasn't only a dress. "And makeup, I haven't been able to use makeup since before I came here."

Arnold moved aside for Kryten. "I've been searching all over for Miss Kochanski and haven't been able to find her anywhere." He was still holding Kristine's shrunk outfit.

"Kris is here, she's sleeping in my quarters tonight Krytie. She's going to have a nice relaxing bath." Dave explained.

Kryten turned towards Kristine then back to Dave. "In here without clothes?" He squeaked, higher pitch than normal.

"Well most likely yeah, she doesn't have anything else to wear," Dave replied.

Kryten sparked and went into a sort of shutdown for a moment before. "Mister Lister shrunk your clothes." Kryten threw them at Kristine.

"Did he?" Kristine said with disinterest.

"Aren't you mad?" Kryten asked in surprise by her lack of angry reaction.

"I'm too tired to be mad. I just want to have my bath and get some sleep." Kristine replied.

"I'll just be going," Kryten was muttering angrily to himself as he stormed out. "A key ring with a C, unbelievable. Thank you with a capital R."

"His programming has become corrupt again," Arnold commented. "Any idea what he is going on about?"

"None at all. We should have a look at that in the morning. Goodnight Kris," Dave said.

"Thank you for this, I really appreciate it," Kristine said to the boys once again.

"Hey no bother," Dave replied making no move to leave.

"Time to go Listy, good night Miss Kochanski," Arnold dragged Dave out the room.

"Night Arnold," Kristine said as they left. "Night Dave."

Arnold and Dave had not gone far from there room when all the lights turned off. Arnold's projection also turning off for a moment, switching him over to soft-light mode. The only light was from Arnold's projection.

"What's going on?" Kristine yelled into the hallway. She'd stepped into the bath as soon as the boys had left and the last thing she wanted to do was deal with an emergency right now.

"Power's gone out. Emergency backup should kick in soon," Dave called back to the room. "You just stay in there. Rimmer and I will handle it. We've done this plenty of times."

They turned as they heard Kryten coming towards them. "Mister Lister, where is Miss Kochanski?" Kryten asked.

"She's in the bath," Dave replied.

"Really?" Cat appeared from a hidden corner and walked right into the bunkroom.

"Cat, you can't do that?" Dave yelled following in.

"I should get them both out," Arnold sighed, following with Kryten into the room. As soon as they were all in the bunkroom the lights came on.

"Do you mind?" Kristine complained, placing her arms over her chest and pulling her knees in.

"Not at all," Cat replied not taking his eyes off Kristine.

The lights chose that moment to turn off again, the door flinging shut. The light of Arnold's projection was once again the only source of light. Even the emergency lights were no longer on. Arnold had even gone transparent with this power outage.

"Now everything's dead," Dave complained as he tried and failed to open the door.

"How come the doors closed and why can I see through alphabet head?" Cat asked only taking his eyes off Kristine for a moment.

"The doors close automatically to prevent fire and reinforce the hull," Dave replied. "It's in one of the safety manuals Rimmer lectures all the time."

"My light-bee automatically puts me on the lowest setting to increase runtime when it cannot detect a power source for me to recharge from. I hate being transparent, I can see through my eyelids when I close my eyes." Arnold nervously complained.

"If everything's out who's steering this create?" Cat asked.

"No one, the autopilot would also be out," Kryten replied.

Cat looked towards Kryten, "you mean this ship is caroming out of control through space with absolutely zero expertise at the helm?"

"No change there then," Kristine commented. While Cat had turned away she'd grabbed a sheet, wrapping it around herself and got out of the bath.

"I like her."Arnold ignored that it was his sheet she'd chosen to use. If the choice was out of his crisp clean sheets and Dave's curry stained sheets and he was Kristine he would choose the same.

"We've got to re-fire the backup generator," Dave said as he tried and failed to get out the room.

"How are we going to do that?" Arnold asked. "In case you haven't noticed we're trapped and I can't touch anything."

"The only way to get to the backup generator is through the service ducts," Kryten announced.

Arnold and Dave groaned.

"The what?" Cat asked.

"Two miles of vent ways that wind their way through the ship," Kryten explained.

"Two miles!" Arnold exclaimed. "Starbug isn't big enough to have two miles of vents."

"Well, it does, Mister Rimmer, sir. We can access the vents from Mister Lister's shower." Kryten ignored explaining how a ship as small as Starbug could have two miles of vents.

"How long is this going to take?" Dave tiredly asked. He was too hot to be crawling around in small cramped vents.

"Six hours sirs," Kryten replied cheerfully.

"Six hours!" Dave and Arnold said together.

"I don't think my battery will last that long," Arnold said in a panic. His battery could last for months or even years or centuries if needed as was proved by Rimmerworld.

\- Red Dwarf -

"It's settled, I can't go in there. I'll just wait here," Arnold walked towards his bed after Kristine had finished getting herself dressed. "What are you doing?" Arnold took a step back as Dave walked towards him. "If I have to go, you have to go." Dave grabbed the light-bee just as Arnold tried to dodge.

"Let me go, I don't want to go. I hate small dark places," Arnold was trying to stop himself from hyperventilating.

Dave was hoisted into the vent. He let go of the light-bee blocking the exit and helped Kristine into the vents.

"How do we get Kryten in here?" Arnold asked looking down at the droid.

Kryten pulled a ladder down from the manhole that none of them had known was there.

"Kryten, did you know about that the entire time?" Dave asked.

From Kryten's guilty expression he knew the answer was yes.

Cat jumped into the vents with ease. "Tell me where I need to go to get my hairdryer and iron working again. My suit had a crease and we won't even mention what is going on with my hair right now."

They followed Kryten through the maze of vents. "We're lost aren't we?" Arnold insisted. "We've already crawled through this vent. We're going in circles. We're going to be stuck in here forever."

The only thing preventing Arnold from having a full blown panic attack was the fact that Dave wasn't doing much better than himself with the small dark cramped vents with no exit.

"I don't like this," Dave stopped, crawling up into a ball. His breathing getting faster and shallower. "The walls are closing in."

"Can you please stop panicking, your panicking is making me panic." The panic attack that Arnold was pushing back was now trying to crawl its way to the surface.

"Sirs, are you alright?" Kryten asked looking towards Dave and Arnold. "I expect this from Mister Rimmer but Mister Lister."

"I need fresh air," Dave grabbed at his throat.

"He's claustrophobic, didn't you know?" Kristine accused the droid.

"He's ... never ... been ... like ... this ... before," Arnold said while gasping for air he didn't need.

"Goalpost head is like this all the time," Cat said not helping in the slightest.

"I'm alright when I know I can get out," Dave said quietly still holding his knees close. "Now we're in the middle of nowhere with no idea where the exit is, I can't breathe."

"I can't breathe either," Arnold reminded everyone.

"You don't need to breathe," Dave snapped back.

"Cat, you go with Kryten to try and find a way out," Kristine asked the feline. "Maybe we can force our way to the generators another way. We need to work out our current location anyway. I'll stay with Dave and Arnold."

Kristine handed Dave a drink of water. She'd come prepared as she could after being trapped in a bunkroom before leaving, especially with how hot it was in the ship.

"I wonder why Dave, my Dave didn't get claustrophobic," Kristine pondered.

"Gee thanks Kris, that's really helping," Dave replied sarcastically.

Dave hated hearing how much better the Dave from Kristine's dimension was and he wasn't the only one. Arnold hated hearing about the hologram who was doing much better than him as a hologram. He'd done well as a hologram but hologram Dave seemed to take it one step further.

"Now is not the time to tell me how great your boyfriend is, I just want to get out of here," Dave whined.

"He wasn't my boyfriend, not really," Kristine confessed. "We were just really good friends."

"But you said," Dave started to say, looking at Kristine in disbelief.

"I didn't want to look like some sad loser when we first met, so I asked him to play along. I wanted him to be my boyfriend but it just didn't work out," Kristine sighed.

"Have you seen us?" Arnold pointed to himself and Dave. "He was wearing a pink dressing gown when we first met with floss stuck between his teeth. You were the furthest thing from a sad loser even if you are single. I mean I've always been single and that doesn't make me a sad loser."

"You're a sad loser because you're a smeghead," Dave managed to insult.

"Dave wasn't my type," Kristine sighed. "I so wished he was but he wasn't."

"Wasn't your type? But he was well dressed, neat, sophisticated and sensitive. Everything you told me you liked everything that I'm not. You're so damn picky, why wasn't he your type?" Dave asked.

"He sounds gay to me, just like Ace," Arnold deduced from Dave's description.

"Exactly, Dave is gay, my Dave that is," Kristine confirmed.

"You see picky. You want him to be absolutely perfect and just because he's-" Dave continued before his brain processed what Kristine said. "Wait wait did you say?"

"She said he was gay, that another version of yourself in another dimension is gay, Listy," Arnold said all too gleefully momentarily forgetting his claustrophobia.

"Rimmer, can you stop interrupting I was asking Kris." Dave snapped at the hologram.

"I said my Dave is gay." Kristine smiled as she thought of her home.

"Are you saying I'm gay in an alternate dimension?" Dave asked, horrified at the thought of a him so similar to the current him being gay.

"Yes," Kristine confirmed.

"Is it really that big a shock?" Arnold asked with an eye roll. "We've met the gay version of me before, smegging Ace Rimmer. So what if in another dimension there is a gay version of you?"

"How many times do I have to tell you Ace wasn't gay, he's bisexual at least the first one was, not sure about the second. There's a difference Rimmer."

"He still liked men no matter how you look at it, me, on the other hand, I am one hundred percent straight. I'd even go as far as saying one thousand percent." Claustrophobia on Arnold's end was now forgotten.

"I wouldn't be so sure about that," Dave teased. "Remember low Rimmer, he was one hundred percent gay."

"He's not me," Arnold replied defensively. "You don't see me going around in fishnet stockings and Goth makeup looking like a reject from the Rocky Horror Picture show."

"Rimmer in fishnet stockings and Goth makeup, I'd like to see that," Kristine said not even able to imagine it.

"I'm sure there are pictures somewhere in the black box recordings," Dave grinned. "He's a part of you Rimmer just like High Rimmer who I am sure is also one hundred percent gay."

"I'm not gay," Arnold insisted once again.

"What is this about high and low Rimmer?" Kristine asked feeling very much out of the loop as she watched Dave and Arnold bicker with one another. Their claustrophobia forgotten for the moment.

They explained to Kristine about splitting the ship into high and low versions and the alternates of themselves.

"So what's this about your version of Dave being gay? Did you actually date him?" Dave asked curious about his other self for the first time. Normally he hated hearing about his perfect other self.

"Yes, that's why we only dated for a couple of weeks," Kristine reminisced. "It was sort of his final attempt at trying to work things out about his sexuality. We never dated in this universe, why not?"

"Listy here didn't have the courage to ask her out. He thought she wouldn't take him seriously because he'd slept with nearly every woman on the ship already." Arnold was the one who replied before Dave could come up with an answer.

"Hang on, Kris you're not suggesting I'm gay because I'm not. I've never even looked at a guy that way before. If anyone's gay it's Rimmer. Every time he loses his mind or ends up plastered he ends up in a dress."

"That has only happened three times, that doesn't mean anything," Arnold defended himself.

"Three times? I can only think of two. What is the third time?"

"It's two, it's only two! I counted wrong," Arnold squeaked. "If you don't know I'm not telling."

"Come on man, I know everything else." Dave tried to worm the answer out. "Even things I don't want to know about you, like about that woman you dated who turned out to be a man. That there is proof that you're at least bi." The teasing went on for a bit but all it did was make Arnold clam up. Dave turned back to Kristine. "Your Dave isn't gay, is he? He's your boyfriend. Why lie about that?"

"It distracted you both didn't it," Kristine replied.

"Miss Kochanski, I need your help," Kryten requested. "We've found a way out but need someone with dainty hands and Cat is refusing to help because he doesn't want to destroy his manicure.

\- Red Dwarf -

Cat was not helping with their claustrophobia which had returned one Kristine had left to help Kryten.

"What cause you to have claustrophobia?" Dave asked.

"I don't know." Arnold shrugged, trying to think of the first time but nothing had been clear. "Could have been a number of things. My brothers locking me in wardrobes, trunks and other things and not letting me out for hours. My father locking me in a small dark room for days on end for punishment and training for the Space Corps. Or the time I was thrown into the septic tank at school or-"

"How is that training for the Space Corps?" Dave interrupted.

"He wanted us to be able to withstand torture if we were captured by the enemy. My fear intensified after I almost drowned in the bathtub. It was small and cramped and I had nowhere to go to escape them and I just felt trapped and everything was dark and closing in around me. Do you know what started yours?"

Arnold listened as Dave told him about the girl he was having an affair with at work. "I was locked in there for hours. I thought he was never going to let me out. When he finally did it was in public and I was stark naked."

"And instead of scaring you off of having sex with woman already in relationships it frightened you of small places?"

"I haven't knowingly been with someone already in a relationship since then. I've been with woman who were with multiple men at the same time but they weren't relationships and it wasn't secret," Dave replied.

"I hear a roaring noise," Cat announced, stopping Dave and Lister's conversation. "Like a watery roaring noise."

Dave realised what the noise was first. "We need to move, the pipes get washed out every four hours.

"Even though we don't have much water?" Arnold asked when the managed to get themselves to safety just in time.

"It uses the same water over and over again. It's meant to be cleaned out but ours hasn't been for years," Kryten said it's to keep the humidity at the correct level in the ship and to stop the air build up or something like that."

"I hear a roaring noise," Cat exclaimed.

"More water?" Arnold asked.

"No, not that noise," Cat replied not at all worried about the noise.

Arnold was starting to panic again, he hated not knowing what was going on around him.

"This is a different noise," Cat said still not explaining what type of noise he was hearing.

"Just tell us what the noise is," Dave insisted, also frustrated at the cat.

"It's a sort of swirly windy water drying hurricaney noise," Cat finally answered.

"The dryer, the vents get dried after they get washed to prevent mould build up," Dave yelled. He and Cat only just had enough time to grab onto the grill they were near before the wind came. Being stuck as a soft-light hologram Arnold couldn't grab onto anything and was blown down the vent ways and through a grill.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold sat up in a daze after he was blown out the vent system and back onto the deck. The first thing he discovered was the doors weren't locked like they were supposed to be. It was just the one in their room that was locked. Another thing Arnold noticed was the temperature was getting hotter in the entire ship and not just in the vents. He couldn't feel the heat but knew how hot it was.

"Why is it so hot in here?" Arnold asked even though no one was around to answer. He walked towards the cockpit to check the readings. Maybe the power came back on while they were in the vents. It was a lot brighter throughout the entire ship and the doors were opening and closing as they should.

Arnold gulped when she saw what Starbug was heading directly towards. It was the sun and they were on a crash course. Not even Starbug as indestructible as the ship was would be able to survive that. Arnold grabbed towards his light-bee. He needed to get himself into hard-light mode and redirect the ship. He wasn't sure if he could steer the ship with no power but he had to do something.

He was nervous to fly the ship, he'd only done it a couple of times. He'd known the theory of how to fly, he'd taught Kryten with that theory while he'd still been stuck in soft-light mode. If he did nothing they would die, he would die permanently. There was no coming back from flying into a sun. The other's were lucky they probably didn't even know they were flying towards a sun to their death.

He jerked when he shifted from soft-light to hard-light. His drive wanted to convert back to soft-light to save power. He was getting a headache from focusing on preventing the switch, his survival instincts keeping him in hard-light. Arnold sat in Dave's seat and gripped the steering wheel as he redirected it. He sighed in relief that the steering still worked. The only thing out on the console was the autopilot. He got them a safe distance from the sun and put them in orbit. He didn't want to direct them into space because they'd end up freezing without the heating system. If everything froze up the steering would lock up and the engines wouldn't start. They would all freeze to death before they had a chance to start the engines.

The temperature should be more comfortable for Dave, Cat and Kristine. That was what his temperature sensor that he'd only discovered that day was telling him. It was currently twenty-eight degrees instead of the forty it was earlier. Still to warm but considering how hot it had been, a lot more pleasant.

Arnold headed towards the generator room, which had been their goal in the first place. Well, they were actually heading towards the backup generator, this was the main generator. He looked at it feeling overwhelmed. He'd never paid attention when Dave and Kryten had attended to it in the past because he'd been soft-light and he never thought he would be able to do this physically at the time. He gulped wishing he paid more attention. He pushed the green start button having no idea what else to do. To his relief the generator roared to life, the air started moving through the vents, the lights flicked back on. He stood watching it for several minutes waiting for it to surge again, but the power seemed to settle. The backup generator also started without any issues.

"What the smeg turned this all off?" Arnold asked no one. He hoped that Dave and Kristine got out of the vents soon. The heating and cooling system was still out but he wouldn't want to be up there with the air cycling.

A beep caused Arnold to jump as he was walking back to the drive room to put the ship into autopilot, back on track of getting the time travel device. It was so tempting to set their course back to following the fading trail of Red Dwarf.

With everything back up, Arnold went to the medi-bay. The beeping of his dying light-bee battery reminding him he needed to get on charge. It was far too low for his liking. Overriding safety features when he forced himself to hard-light had drained the battery. He allowed himself to shift back to soft-light, finding himself even more transparent than before. He walked towards the charging station wondering how long it would take for Kristine and Dave to realise the power was back on and get themselves out the vents. He hoped it was hours.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

"Hey, welcome back." Dave greeted Arnold as he woke up from charging.

Arnold felt a lot better, as he looked around the medibay where he was standing. His head clear. No beeping and he could switch between modes with ease. Even after all these years he still felt slight disorientation from waking while standing.

"Did you get the generator started and steer us out of the sun's path?" Kristine asked, taking his hand.

Arnold looked at their intertwined hands, her hand was warm just like Dave's hand had been. He really could feel her heat, he hadn't been imagining it. He could feel the warmth of a human. It made him feel alive knowing that he could feel the warmth of another person.

"Arnold, are you alright?" Kristine asked when he didn't respond to her question.

"Fine, just tickety-boo," Arnold squeaked out, pulling back his own hand. He wasn't used to being touched by anyone and the warmth was distracting him. "I got the power on and steered us away from the sun. It wasn't too difficult. The hardest part was overriding my safety features to force myself to hard-light mode. I do know how to drive a ship even if I don't do it often. I put us into orbit around the planet and turned the generator back on. None of the doors were locked, except our bunkroom. Would've come for you," Arnold lied. "I needed to charge my battery first. It was rather low." That was not a lie, he was lucky to get to the charging station before it went flat.

"We figured that when we found your light-bee on the floor next to the charging station. You just gave off a weak beep when I tried to turn you back on the first time after half an hour on the charge," Dave said.

Arnold looked to the charging station then to the floor. He thought that he'd put himself on the charger. It was a mild embarrassment that he had not.

"It's starting to become a habit owning you my life," Kristine said placing a hand on his shoulder.

Arnold brushed her hand off, he didn't need the sensory overload right now. "Anyone know what caused the issues in the first place?"

"Kryten," Dave replied. "He turned the power off on purpose."

"What, he wasn't happy with killing the Nova 5, he needed to kill us as well." Arnold shrieked. He knew that Kryten's programming was corrupted but he hadn't realised it was that corrupt. That their lives were now in danger because of the malfunctioning mechanoid.

"He did this all because he didn't want me to have a bath. He thought that Dave was staying with me. He's jealous." Kristine replied with a sigh.

"We really need to fix his programming. We don't need to deal with a situation like this every time Kristine takes a bath or anytime Lister is alone with you." Arnold replied wondering how to even go about fixing Kryten's programming without changing him back to factory defaults. He knew that Dave would be devastated if he was changed from who he was now. Something had to be done for their safety without changing Kryten to much that he ended up being different then he was. Dave's depression would be more dangerous than near-death experiences from the malfunctioning mechanoid if they resorted Kryten back to factory settings.

"Agreed, he kept going on about being alone and having GELFs to dinner," Dave said he looked towards the direction of the laundry where Kryten spent most of his time. A frown covering his face.

"Maybe he misses that blob GELF and wants her over for dinner," Arnold suggested. "Wonder whatever happened to those blobs? Think we'll even come across them again."

"Who knows. Camille is probably still around somewhere." Dave turned to Kristine, glad for the distraction. "Camille was a pleasure GELF Kryten saved." Explaining quickly about their short time with Camille.

"You may have to fix more than Kryten's programming. I dented his head with the wrench for putting us through this for a stupid reason." Kristine admitted.

Arnold grinned, "oh I wish I had seen that." He'd wanted to do that for a long time but knew that Dave would never let him live it down if he did. He really liked this version of Kristine Kochanski. She fit in nicely with their misfit crew and didn't say Rimmer like smeg like the Kristine Kochanski of their own dimension. If she had ended up with them he would be begging Wildfire to take him to another dimension.

Arnold yawned. Being on charge was not restful and the other two looked like they hadn't slept either. Both covered in grease, probably from checking the engine and generator.

"Cat's had a full night's sleep, he's on watch at the moment. Sleep for us three and then we fix Kryten in the morning or next week." Kristine said.

"You both need a bath, you're going to get grease all over the sheets," Arnold looked at the filthy pair. "Then again it will keep Kryten distracted when he tries to get the grease stains out."

Dave grinned and looked towards Kristine.

"He doesn't mean having a bath or sleeping together," Kristine said to Dave knowing exactly what he was thinking.

"I don't care what you both do, as long as you're both clean. I know I said I'd give up my room for the night. That was before crawling through air vents. I really need my own bed right now." Arnold yawned again.

The three of them stumbled to the bunk room. Arnold collapsing on his unmade bed and asleep as soon as his head was in the place the pillow should be. Having switched to soft-light mode. Light snores coming from him moments later.

"It's been a long day, he doesn't even look peaceful in his sleep," Kristine said sitting on the floor next to Arnold. If she wasn't still covered in grease she would have sat at the end of his bed.

"He never does, he's always having nightmares and moaning and groaning and talking in his sleep," Dave replied.

"Dave, can you leave while I have a bath." Kristine requested. "Go have a shower."

"But you're going to have a bath with Rimmer in the room?" Dave looked towards his sleeping bunkmate.

"Go," Kristine pushed Dave out the door.

Arnold remained oblivious that he had a naked woman not even a meter away from him as he slept.

\- Red Dwarf -

Kryten was on thin ice with the entire crew. While they liked adventures to keep them from being bored, they didn't appreciate them in the middle of the night when they should've all been sleeping. It was like he was trying to replace what Holly used to do for them before they'd lost Red Dwarf. Keeping them preoccupied so they didn't die of boredom. So they didn't think about how lonely it was being the last remnants of known humanity.

"Kryten, do you realise how close you came to killing baby Dave," Kristine asked in a cold voice after the droid had been repaired.

"I thought he would be alright in the medi-bay in the in -vitro tube. It has backup batteries. I checked before I turned the power off," Kryen said in a high-pitched voice he only used when upset.

"While that is true, the batteries almost ran out." Kristine glared and Kryten who looked even more guilty. "Do you know what would happen if he died?" She didn't even pause for Kryten to answer. "What would happen is you would go back to the Nova 5 because there would be no Dave to rescue you. There would be no Cat and Rimmer would not be a hologram, he'd be dead with the rest of the crew as would I." She took several deep breaths then turned towards Arnold. "Arnold sweetie, how far are we from the derelict?"

Arnold jumped at how he was addressed not sure if the kind tone was actually for him. "Two weeks." He finally answered. "We just have to hope that we don't have any simulant threats this time."

"I'm going to see if Mister Lister needs lunch," Kryten winced as he walked out of the cockpit, leaving Kristine and Arnold alone. Both were on duty since they'd had more sleep then Dave who'd instead of having a shower spent the night fixing the mechanoid instead of sleeping.

"I can't believe it," Kristine said as she was looking at the console. "I've found a way home."

Arnold brought up his own console seeing that she was indeed correct, there was a dimensional rift nearby.

"If you go home now you won't be around when the baby is born. Do you really want to miss that?" Arnold asked. He wanted her to stay, he actually felt like he had a friend when Kristine was around. He felt that both Dave and Kristine were his friends. He had friends for the first time in his life. But if she were to leave his fragile friendship with Dave would probably disintegrate.

"I don't want to miss my son's birth, we haven't even started the process yet. It could be years before we have everything we need to safely grow a baby on this junk pile. I may never get back to my own dimension, back to my own Dave."

"Will you still have the same relationship with your Dave knowing his is your biological son?" It was another thing that Arnold had wondered. Another thing they had all wondered.

"I don't know. A part of me wants to go back to the relationship we had before. I really love him. I miss my friends. I miss my Cat and Kryten and ship and while I get along with you all. This just isn't my home. You are all my friends except maybe Kryten but they are my family."

"I've enjoyed having you around, I'm now not the most hated crew member. If felt nice to not be the most hated because Kryten dislikes you more than me. I've always felt like an outsider to the crew." Arnold admitted. "It's them and then me. They'd be better off without me, I'm useless. I should have left when I had the chance."

"You're not useless Arnold, you saved my life twice. You saved the entire crew."

Kristine smiled at him which felt foreign to Arnold since usually when people smiled at him they were playing a nasty joke. But this was a different smile. It was a soft smile and it left him feeling confused.

"You would have managed without me. I'm going to miss you when you go home. I wish you the best in your home dimension. Now let's change our course slightly for the rift. The paddle is always going to be there later."

"Thank you, Arnold," Kristine smiled even brighter.

\- Red Dwarf -

While they followed the altered the course they spent their shift talking about school and family, just to distract themselves.

"I've never been able to talk to my own Dave properly. His school and family are totally different from my own." Kristine said. "I tried but it would always end up back to him in some way. He had no interest in that part of my life."

"As in he never went to school and even when his Gran was still alive he got away with everything."

"Yes. You know what it is like to have strict parents with high expectations and brothers who surpass those expectations to the extreme. I never thought that we would have something in common. I regret not getting to know you better before the accident."

"You're different from the Kochanski from this dimension. I don't think we ever would have got along like-" he could just not say me and you out loud, what happened if he was reading things wrong? He wasn't exactly that good at reading people.

Cat came waltzing in. "Shift time change, Yeow."

"Isn't Dave meant to be with you? He should be up by now?" Kristine asked when she didn't see Dave anywhere.

"Monkey boy, he hardly turns up when we have more than one person on shift," Cat replied taking his seat.

"I'll go get him. Goodnight Miss Kochanski." Arnold stood from his own seat, leaving Kristine to talk to Cat. He could hear her telling him about the course change.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold looked around his shared room. The bath was now gone and Dave was tidying his side of the room instead of heading to the cockpit.

"Do my eyes deceive me? Are you cleaning? Has hell frozen over? Are you sick?" For the second time that week he placed a hand on Dave's forehead. He was a touch cooler than yesterday. They weren't flying so close to any suns at the moment so he wasn't overheated.

Dave batted his hand away. "Just time for a spring clean."

Arnold snorted. Normally it was Kryten who cleaned. Dave never did his own cleaning, spring cleaning, as if. "No, it's not. You're just trying to impress Miss Kochanski." Arnold took a seat at the table eyeing his bed to make sure Dave hadn't thrown his junk all over it. It was still crisply made as it was that morning before he left the room. He'd been a little distraught when he awoke and discovered he'd slept on an unmade bed. "It's not going to work. In case you're forgetting she's your mother."

"Will you stop reminding me that she's me, mum." Dave sighed. "It's not that, it's time I grew up a little."

"And if you had done any growing up you would have gone to your shift with Cat and finished this off later, that would be the adult thing to do." Arnold reminded Dave of exactly where he was supposed to be.

"Cat can handle Starbug on his own," Dave replied unconcerned. He opened a cupboard and pulled out his shoes, sitting on the other side of the table. "It's not like we're both needed."

"Taking a step in being matures is going to work when it's your shift. What will Kristine think knowing her son is skipping work?"

"Will you drop the mum thing! Sometimes I swear you're the one who's my mother." Dave started spit shining his shoes.

"That is disgusting," Arnold scrunched up his nose and the spit.

"Better then urine recyc," Dave replied.

And he had a point there. Nearly anything was better than urine recyc.

"Good morning sirs, how about some breakfast," Kryten offered Dave a typical curry meal.

"It's dinner time Kryten," Arnold corrected.

"Well since Mister Lister has only been awake a short time, it is his breakfast time." Kryten corrected Arnold.

"I'm not eating that spicy stuff anymore," Dave answered, not looking up from the boots.

"I knew it, hell has frozen over. You not eat curry! That must mean the world has ended. Oh wait, I forgot it already had. The universe then," Arnold teased.

"I agree with Mister Rimmer," Kryten said in worry. "You not eating spicy food is like a zebra not being stripy or an old lady not sitting on a park bench with her legs wide open. May I ask why?"

"We don't know for certain that the Earth is gone," Dave glared at Arnold for his suggestion that his home planet was gone. "Besides I'm not eating spicy stuff because it makes your breath smell like a lift full of senile donkeys returning from a garlic eating competition."

"That has never bothered you before sir," Kryten said.

"I wish that it did. Be glad that you don't share a room with him Krytie," Arnold said with disgust.

"Well it bothers me now," Dave put his shoe down.

"It's because of her isn't it," Kryten said clearly jealous. Dave obviously hadn't fixed any Kryten's programming when he physically fixed him. "She who must be drooled over."

"You mean Kris?" Dave clarified despite knowing who Kryten was talking about. They didn't exactly have any other females on the ship. Even the appliances that Kryten had named all had male names.

Kryten looked away. "No matter my feeling for her," he spat the her. "I will not be making petty criticisms of fellow crew members. There is, of course, the issue with the salad cream."

"Salad cream? Do we even have salad cream?" Arnold asked looking towards Dave who shrugged.

They ignored Kryten as he ranted about salad cream and how Kristine kept moving it.

"I like Kristine, she's nice once you get to know her." Arnold smiled. "Our shift together just now went swimmingly."

"You're right hell has frozen over," Dave laughed. "You liking Kristine Kochanski, first moon we drop her off." He joked.

"Pity she's going home soon," Arnold sighed. "She made things so interesting."

"Going home?" Kryten said gleefully while Dave said in despair. "What do you mean going home?"

"While we were on our shift we found a dimension rift that have just the right conditions to get Miss Kochanski home.

Dave and Kryten both left the room to find out if that was true. Arnold returned to his reading.

-Red Dwarf -

Arnold had abandoned his book for the bunk and was almost asleep when someone came running into the room who didn't sound like Dave. He rolled over to see Kristine standing in the doorway.

"All the alerts are flashing," she told him in concern.

Arnold sat up rubbing the non-existent sleep from his eyes. "All of them?" Kristine nodded. "They weren't flashing when we finished our shift," Arnold said unconcerned. "Is it a real alert?"

Kristine shrugged. "No idea. With this rust bucket it could mean anything. I'm surprised you're so calm." Kristine observed as Arnold pulled on a dressing gown and slippers which looked a lot more decent then the monstrosity Dave owned. "In my universe, you would panic during planned drills. Medical staff were always on standby just for you."

Arnold stretched and then remembered he was a hologram. He placed the dressing gown and slippers back where they belonged and flashed into his uniform. "You sort of get used to living in constant danger after a while. It actually gets rather dull."

They rushed to the cockpit which was already manned by Dave, Cat and Kryten. Kristine sat in Arnold's seat before he had a chance to sit down.

"What do we have?" Arnold asked looking over Kristine's shoulder.

"It's fast and movey and leaving a long cold trail," Cat replied.

"It's a phasing comet," Kristine said from the panel.

"Kryten?" Dave asked the mechanoid having no idea what a phasing comet was.

"How am I meant to concentrate on phasing comets when every time I turn my back the salad cream gets warm?" Kryten complained still in a tizzy.

Arnold shook his head at Kryten. "You're really still on about that, now of all times? If you're not going to be any help you can get out." Arnold pointed towards the door. "You can let me have that console and go put the salad cream back in the fridge or cupboard or wherever it is you think it belongs instead of complaining about it. Throw it out the airlock."

Kryten muttered. "But this isn't even your console." He didn't move from his spot.

"Plotting avoidance course," Kristine announced while tapping away at the screen faster than Arnold could follow.

"Why? What's the problem with going through?" Dave turned to ask. "It will get you home faster if we go through it."

"Are you mad!" Arnold shouted. "You want us to put ourselves in unnecessary risk just to get her home faster?" She won't get home at all if we fly through that thing. It will be a one way trip to the afterlife for all of us, that is where we will be heading if you go through there."

"I agree with Arnold," Kristine said not looking up from the console. "I will get home without putting ourselves at unnecessary risk."

"We can make it," Dave said confidently. "We've been in hairier situations before."

Cat turned to Dave. "The one that nearly killed us?"

"No the other one, look we can make it," Dave said still confident.

"Everyone's gone mad and is trying to kill us," Arnold said in exasperation. "First Kryten and now you! It was only yesterday we almost ran into a sun. We don't need to run into a comet."

"Do you even know what a comet is made from?" Kristine asked looking at Dave.

"He doesn't," Arnold replied before Dave had a chance to.

"Yes I do, it's made out of gas," Dave replied like he wasn't stupid.

"It's made out of ice," Kristine corrected.

"I knew that an icy type of gas," Lister nodded to himself.

"Well whatever it is, we are going to hit it in forty-five seconds," Cat screeched while bracing his steering wheel.

"We need to turn around now," Kristine screamed.

"Here it is," Cat announced moments later.

"That wasn't forty-five seconds," Kristine threw down her hands as the ship shook from the icy tail of the comet they were flying through.

"Sorry, I was reading the potato bake timer instead. Can you not leave this in here; it makes it look like we don't know what we're doing." Cat said showing them the timer which was now buzzing.

"That's probably because we don't know what we're doing. Everything is just guesswork. Kryten, get the potato bake out the oven before it burns." Arnold instructed the still fuming droid who was still mumbling about salad cream.

"Yes Mister Rimmer sir," Kryten stood to his feet, walking all over the place as the shaking got worse.

Arnold ducked and Kristine shrieked as he crawled in between her legs to get under the console. "What are you doing?

"Hell has frozen over, that's what," Arnold held his knees close as he shook.

"If we don't turn around we're going to get ripped to shreds," Kristine tried to yell over the noise.

"Turn around you stupid goit," Arnold screamed in fear.

Dave gave a heavy sigh as the shaking got even worse and finally relented and turned the ship around. Getting them out the comet trail and back to where they had been before."

Arnold got himself out of the console without going between Kristine's legs as soon as they were safe.

"Well say it," Dave said as he looked at the rest of the crew.

"You're a total and utter smeghead who almost got us all killed because you were thinking with the wrong head," Arnold insulted.

"Not you, her," Dave pointed to Kristine.

"I won't say it," Kristine crossed her arms.

"Say it," Dave egged Kristine on. He kept at it until she eventually gave in.

"Fine, you want to hear it so much I'll say it. My Dave would've never got us almost killed like that."

"You had to say it," Dave complained.

"You've only got yourself to blame Listy, you wanted her to say it," Rimmer pointed out.

"The potato bake is ready sirs," Kryten held up the potato bake that had managed to survive the bumpy ride.

Kristine stormed out the cockpit before Kryten could start on about the salad cream again.

"Why didn't that work?" Dave asked looking back at his console.

Cat turned, pointing towards his console. "According to this here, the thrusters didn't work because we're carrying too much weight."

"I've been telling you, it's Miss Kochanski's laundry. Those little frilly things are heavier than they look," Kryten complained.

"You should go to the cargo hold and see what can be jettisoned," Cat suggested. "I'll stay here and fix my hair."

"You coming, Rimmer?" Dave asked Arnold.

"I better, otherwise you'll get rid of all my stuff and none of your own," Arnold said turning towards the door.

"But sir, what about dinner?" Kryten asked. Holding the potato bake still.

"We'll have it after we got through some things. I'm not hungry." Dave replied.

"Oh sir, before you go. You didn't deliberately damage the ship so Miss Kochanski couldn't get home and had to stay behind?" Kryten asked something that Arnold had wondered himself.

"No I didn't," Dave sighed. "I don't want her to go, but at the same time I wanted to make her happy and that is getting her home."

"The only one who has deliberately damaged the ship recently is you Kryten," Arnold said cheerfully though a tiny part of him believed that Dave had deliberately damaged the ship, even if he was unaware himself.

\- Red Dwarf -

The cargo bay had boxes open and placed into piles for keep, trash and unsure if they would be kept or not. Arnold and Kryten would need to find better homes for everything that they would be keeping.

Arnold was glaring at Dave with what he'd just put into the trash pile.

"I use those," Arnold picked them up and put them into the keep pile.

"It's a shoehorn, they need to go. You don't even have any shoes. All your shoes are holographic," Dave looked at Arnold's perfectly shined holographic shoes. "The only real thing you own that goes on your feet is a pair of bed socks and a set of slippers."

"It doesn't matter that I don't have shoes right now. Eventually, I will have shoes again," Arnold huffed. "When we get back to Red Dwarf."

"You have shoehorns on Red Dwarf," Dave rolled his eyes. "I don't even know anyone else that uses them besides you. And that is including before the accident. I can't believe you. You gave them all different names and a timetable so they could spend the same amount of time in your shoes. Who does that type of thing?"

Arnold crossed his arms and tried to make himself appear smaller.

"If they are so important why aren't they up in your room? Why are they down here in storage?" Dave asked seeing a few of Arnold's belongings were down here. More then what was in his room which wasn't hard considering he hardly had anything in their shared room.

"Fine, we'll get rid of them but only if you get rid of something of yours," Arnold moved them to the maybe pile.

Dave looked around for something of his that he didn't care about. "I'll get rid of me golf clubs," Dave picked up the clubs, one of them a bit bent."

"Those aren't just yours," Arnold said taking one of the clubs and examining it. It had his name engraved on the side. "We still need these."

"What for? We've only played golf once and neither of us were any good at it." Dave said remembering how much Arnold had yelled at him when it was revealed Dave had stolen his golf ball because it had gone around the entire planetoid they were playing on.

"Not for golf, to hit simulants over the head. I'm sure it would work better than our boozokids, especially since we are heading back to that ship that is really unstable. I really don't want to go back there."

"Fine, clubs stay, what next," Dave picked up the next item. "What about this, think we need it?"

It took hours and a lot of arguing. Kryten ended up bringing the potato bake down to them to eat so it didn't get cold. While Kryten was distracted by the useless junk in the garbage pile the Technicians both took the chance to throw out the salad cream to stop Kryten and Kristine from fighting over it. They stayed down in the cargo bay in order to avoid Kristine who was still upset about missing her window to get home.

\- Red Dwarf -

Kryten was on cockpit duty, keeping an eye on their course while the living crew members could enjoy a nights rest after the eventual day and night before. It had been a spur of the moment thing when they'd found the games in the cargo hold.

"I now declare games night officially open," Dave handed out beer, real beer that wasn't recyc beer that had been hidden in the cargo hold. Arnold who normally didn't drink even took one for himself just because it was a beverage that hadn't been recycled. "Seeing as Kris is with us and this is her first games night, you can have the first choice of our game. As you're a bit sensitive we're not going to have any of the games that involve dropping trousers or lighting stuff."

"Thank God," Arnold said taking a sip of his beer and scrunching up his face. He'd never liked the taste.

"Let's play the magic flute," Kristine suggested with excitement which quickly fell to disappointment when she saw the boys' blank faces.

"The magic what now?" Cat asked the others hoping for an answer.

"What's that?" Musical chairs?" Dave took a guess. "Could be fun, we haven't played that yet and I know it's for kids but it's something."

"No, not musical chairs, it's an opera," Kristine replied.

"That magic flute?" Arnold said like he knew what she was actually talking about. "You want us to perform an opera. Us?" He pointed to Dave.

"No, we don't perform an opera. What we have to do is hum a section of aria and the others have to guess which character is singing," Kristine explained.

Dave and Cat shared a blank look.

Arnold beamed. This was something he had a chance of winning. He'd been dragged to opera's all his life by his mother, much to his father's dismay. His always enjoyed going to the opera but pretended he detested them because he was worried that he wouldn't be allowed to go if his father and brothers knew that he liked it, then he wouldn't have been allowed to go.

"That's a game?" Cat asked. Both he and Dave didn't look convinced it was a game at all.

"It sounds like medieval torture," Dave claimed.

"No, it's really good because you can throw each other off the scent," Kristine explained with enthusiasm.

"Miss Kristine, these two uneducated goits don't know the first thing about opera. I'd be happy to play the next time we're on duty together." Arnold said.

"You know about opera?" Dave laughed. "Since when?"

"Since my mother used to drag me with her because she didn't want to go alone. My father detested the opera and my brothers wouldn't be caught dead at one so I was dragged along.

"So what games do you play then? Match the body part to the crew member?" Kristine asked in a sarcastic tone not actually believing that was one of their games.

"I've always loved that one, let's play," Cat grinned a toothy grin.

"It's not the same without Red Dwarf," Dave sighed.

Arnold reminisced. "Back when we were on Red Dwarf they would swap out my body parts with other crew members and make me guess whose body part I had. Certain crew members would attack me. Then there was this one time I got stuck with one of your breasts and your hips for a full day."

"Hey you only have yourself to blame, you did that you yourself," Dave said. "It's what gave me the idea for the game in the first place." Dave turned to Kristine. "This was back in the early days, I really didn't want Rimmer to be my hologram so I was trying to turn you on. He replaced his holodisc so he would look like you thinking he could trick me. It didn't work of course."

"Why did you stop trying to turn him off?" Kristine asked.

"I'm still trying to turn him off," Cat said. "How about we do that right now?"

Dave shrugged. "Guess he grows on you after a while."

"Like a parasite," Cat said. "A really really bad annoying parasite that you just can't get rid of."

Instead of playing games the four of them ended up reminiscing about before they'd known one another and the games they would play to stem off boredom. Most of Cats games the feline still played on a daily basis.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

With the delays they'd had with trying to get to Kristine's dimension and the need to fix the heating and cooling system, they were two weeks behind the original projected date they thought they would get to the derelict.

"With our terrible luck we are bound to get into trouble," Arnold groaned.

They didn't get into trouble which came as a surprise to everyone. They found the paddle that would help them time travel. Refuelled and were able to take their time to stock on essential food and most importantly, water. They'd wasted a lot of water clearing out the tanks and the filtration systems. A full clean was well overdue, so it didn't taste like it had been recycled as many times as it was. And while they had the excess resources, it made sense to use it when they could.

As soon as they were out of simulant space they tested the device to confirm it was still functional in getting them to the past and back again.

"It's time," Kristine said, barely containing her excitement. "We have everything we need, the ship is in top form for a three-million-year-old vessel. We have completed maintenance of the entire ship. We have food, water, power and we're ready to grow a baby. Everything is working correctly."

"You make it sound like you're growing sea monkeys," Cat said as he looked at the artificial uterus, disgust covering his features.

"Like a sea monkey we will not be able to see anything at first, and slowly the baby will get bigger and bigger," Arnold said while he watched with a nervous Dave and Kristine placed the in vitro tube in the bottom of the electronic uterus.

The contraption beeped to confirm the in vitro tube was in the correct position. Kristine closed everything, and they all watched as it began to fill with fluid that didn't look like water. The machine beeped again when the fluid finished filling. Then did another beep when everything was to temperate. Then several more beeps indicating different settings were correct. Kristine gasped when the beep confirmed the egg had been released from the in vitro tube into the fluid.

"This is so weird knowing that embryo we can't even see yet is me." Dave was trying to find himself in the fluid. "He placed a hand on Kristine's shoulder who was glued to the screen which hadn't changed since the egg was released. "Kris, nothing else is going to change. No point watching anymore."

"That baby may not be you," Arnold looked over the pair of them, hoping to get it through their skulls. "You're just making assumptions. It will only be when the baby is developed enough to do a DNA test that we will know for certain if that is you, Listy or your child."

"DNA test, why didn't I think of that sooner," Kristine stood up straight knocking into Arnold. "If Dave really is my son, a DNA test will prove it."

Arnold rubbed his nose where Kristine had bumped into him.

"Let's do it. We just need your DNA Kris, mines already on file." Dave looked back towards the baby growing machine. "It will also stop us from checking on this little one every few seconds."

"My DNA is also on file from when we uploaded my crew's data," Kristine said as she opened up the software and the records they would need to compare DNA on file.

They all watched the screen in anticipation as the results populated on the screen.

Dave was looking at a bunch of gibberish when Arnold inhaled sharply, had a look of disbelief and then of teasing. "She really is your mummsie. I guess that really is you in there." He looked towards the pod.

"We haven't even got the results yet," Dave rolled his eyes at Arnold.

"It's all there already, they both match, here, here here and here," Arnold pointed the screen of Kristine and Dave's DNA. "The computer is just working out the percentage of how much it matches. Would be so much faster if Holly were around."

The results finally finished compiling a moment later and proved Arnold correct, the strands of DNA were the same in the sections he pointed out to them.

"How is it you can look at DNA and pick out the differences, but you cannot learn anything about Astronavigations?" Kristine asked.

Arnold shrugged. "How about we run Miss Kochanski and Miss Kristine's DNA against one another and see if they really are the same despite being the same."

Kristine had the information up before he'd stopped talking.

"They're both different slightly," Arnold said at the two DNA samples.

"Don't be stupid; they are the same person. They should be the same," Dave rolled his eyes.

"No, Arnold is correct it is different. This is rather interesting, According to this, my other self is my full sister and not me. I wonder if this is a common thing for DNA of the same person between dimensions.

The results populated moments later saying what the other two had already said.

"We haven't thought to get DNA samples of the other alternates of ourselves to check. Never considered that they would be different," Dave said. "We've met more versions of Rimmer then of myself. Only one of those Rimmer's was still alive."

"Let's run it against my Dave," Kristine pulled up her crew file running her boyfriend and Dave against one another. They had similar results to the two Kochanski's, slightly different.

"So what does that mean?" Dave asked. His results with his other self were more alike than Kochanski's but still different.

"Identical twins are a possibility. You might not be the same person. Miss Kochanski's timeline might not break off at the point we originally thought it did. It might have been different the entire time," Arnold said in answer.

"Do you have Rimmer on file?" Dave asked.

"Well I don't have a messed up history like you two do so mine should still be the same," Arnold said confidently that his DNA was identical. "What the smeg," he exclaimed when he saw that his DNA was even more different then Kochanski's.

"What?" Dave wanted to know. He hated that Arnold knew what was happened before he did.

"Holy smeg," Kristine exclaimed. "You and you aren't even full siblings. You have at least one different parent. That is really interesting. You both looked and acted so much the same. You're the same, and yet your DNA says you're not."

"I wonder if it's the same for Ace," Dave said.

"Do you think anyone else has DNA like mine?" Arnold asked softly.

"Don't know, let's find out." Dave said as they ran the rest of the DNA from Kristine's crew against their own crew. Arnold was not the only one who had DNA that was drastically different. Once they ran out of DNA to check, they watched the new life form that was slowly, ever so slowly growing.

\- Red Dwarf -

It was a slow day aboard Starbug. They'd finish comparing every single persons DNA against one another, seeing if any of the crew were secretly related. The ship wasn't breaking down, and they weren't desperately short on supplies. The heating and cooling system was working properly once again. There were no derelicts to explore in this current section of the galaxy, and they would not come across the next one for a few more weeks. Kryten was doing the laundry, Cat was in his room sewing himself a new suit from the supplies he got off the last derelict and Arnold was in the cockpit fiddling around with an extra monitor that he'd mounted to the wall and to Dave's surprise was actually displaying statistics of some type.

"What's this?" Dave asked, managing to startle Arnold into dropping the tools he'd been working with.

"Listy, didn't see you there," Arnold turned and greeted, looking rather smug despite the startle. "This here is your vitals, or at least I think it is your vitals." Arnold pointed to the top half of the screen, which had squiggly lines. The bottom half of the screen mirrored slightly. "Bit hard to tell."

Dave's eyes widened. "Are you sure it's wise to build an interface to the uterus? What happens if you broke something? You could of killed me."

"Well, as you can see I broke nothing, everything is working perfectly," Arnold announced the grin still plastering his face.

"I'm going to find Kris. She's going to flip when she sees what you've done," Dave walked towards to door into Kristine.

"What has Arnold done?" Kristine asked in a scolding tone.

"He's built an interface to monitor the baby," Dave said. "He could of killed me."

"That's actually a brilliant idea, why didn't I think of that sooner. You should have come and got me, I would have done this myself, it is not wise to mess around with something like this around. You could of killed my baby if you did something wrong." Kristine took a look at the monitor and overall Arnold's work.

"I know what I am doing," Arnold insisted. "I have some fine-tuning left to do. It's almost ready. As you can see, it shows all the important vitals. Temperature, heart rate, movement. And you can even hear their heart." Arnold turned on the sound.

"Oh, that's my baby," Kristine fussed. "Why doesn't it sound right? What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," Arnold replied calmly.

"Just needs more fine-tuning?" Dave assumed.

"No, the sound works perfectly," Arnold replied. "I discovered this morning when I was setting everything up. Dave, you're a twin."

"A what?" Dave asked. "Me a twin? My twin is the other me, that's why our DNA was that little bit different?"

"Two?" Kristine whispered, eyes darting between the two lines. "Oh my babies. I never imagined." Kristine gushed. "No wonder why you have two lots of vitals, I thought you'd made a mistake or that you were trying to get the two to line up, so you knew if it was correct or not. I never even considered."

"I am assuming that the second baby is Miss dimension traveller's Dave," Arnold said, waiting for her reaction about her boyfriend.

"My Dave? My Dave is the other baby," Kristine took a seat at Arnold's console. "My boyfriend Dave, is my son? A twin? I never considered that we would need to get to the past in my own dimension. Oh, this is confusing. I just assumed the break-off point for our universe was at a different point. Here Arnold and I have been trying to narrow it down. No wonder why we weren't getting anywhere, our dimensions were different from the start."

"Rimmer's DNA being different should of tipped you both off that something was different from way back," Lister said.

"Everything is right on track for how many weeks they are," Arnold proudly exclaimed.

"How would you even know that?" Kristine said with disbelief. "Are you a medical professional? I've been reading up on everything, and I'm not even one hundred percent sure. What even made you consider having the vials displayed in the cockpit? I know it's the room we are most of the time?"

"Unlike you, I actually have some experience in this field." Arnold replied. "I know that the twins are on track. I spent a lot of time researching pregnancy years ago, and I have been refreshing myself again ever since you first turned up with the in vitro tube because I knew that eventually it would be used whether it was Dave or not. I just would have preferred this to be a bit later considering the current situation."

"He's a worrywart," Dave said, which wasn't anything new. Arnold worried about everything. "Going by past experience he will give us daily updates on the babies progress until he is- until they are born. That will eventually turn into hourly updates as it gets closer to delivery day."

"Going by past experience, Arnold how many children do you have?" Kristine looked towards Arnold.

"None," Arnold replied bitterly. He always wanted to be a father, prove that he would be a better father than his own father.

"David?" She turned to the other male crew member.

"Twin boys Jim and Bexley." Dave was trying to hide how heartbroken he was.

"And that is just the kids he knows about, we all know that Davy boy here had a very active sex life before and on Red Dwarf. He probably has kids he doesn't know about." Arnold crossed his arms bitterly. "I, on the other hand, left behind no children. No one to continue the proud Rimmer family tree. My family line ends with me."

"That's a good thing. Don't need anyone else like you and from what you've said your family tree is messed up," Dave replied, still upset thinking of the sons he never got to raise.

"When were they born? I cannot imagine Arnold being involved before the accident and after you don't exactly have many options after. Who's their mother?" Kristine asked,

Arnold rubbed his hands together with anticipation. "Oh can I tell her."

"Just do it," Dave sighed. "You told everyone else." He kept his eyes on Kristine, worried about how she was doing to react.

"They were born close to two years after we'd been in deep space together, Listy here is Jim and Bexley's mother," Rimmer said proudly.

"Mother? He was pregnant?" Kristine asked Arnold who gleefully nodded. "Serious? How did that even happen?"

"Remember the reverse gender universe I was telling you about?" Arnold asked Kristine who did in fact remember. "I didn't tell you everything that happened while we were in the other dimension. In the reverse gender universe, it is the men who have the babies, not the woman. While we were their Lister and Miss Lister got completely and totally drunk and slept with one another. A few months later, they had twin boys. After they were born, they were not compatible with our dimension, they were ageing two fast. By three days they were the equivalent of eighteen years old. It took that long to get the Holly hop drive working again to send them to the dimension they were conceived in. We stayed long enough to make sure they were safe and well."

Dave was sobbing by the end of the story. "I miss them still. Rimmer was such a pain. He kept reading all these pregnancy books to me. Comparing a few books that he got from Arlene about the difference between the two universes. He followed me around everywhere, quoting the baby books to me. Wouldn't let me smoke, wouldn't let me have beer milkshakes or curry."

"The curry was giving you horrendous indigestion and setting off morning sickness." Rimmer explained to Kristine.

"I was in denial, I didn't think I could have children like that." Dave was trying to make his voice calmer and failing. It felt like the twins were dead because they weren't with them. It took a lot of reminding himself that they were still alive in another dimension.

"You shouldn't smoke or have beer milkshakes anyway." Kristine agreed with Arnold with cutting him off. She'd had that removed from her Dave's holographic options when he'd been turned on. He'd gone through withdrawal which she hadn't known was possible for a hologram at the time.

"It wasn't just that, he kept telling me what was healthy for the baby, making me eat healthy food. He managed to get the vending machines reprogrammed while he was a soft-light hologram to only give me the meals that were good for the babies. He even trained a scutter to deliver the twins. Needed the scutter as well." Dave held up his shirt showing the scar which Kristine examined closely. She'd seen in before but hadn't ever imagined it was a caesarean scar.

"Rimmer was a nervous wreck the day they were born. You would swear they were his with how he was acting. I-I still miss them," Dave sobbed as he fixed his shirt. "I think of them every day. Wondering what if they were around. How different I would be? Now I am not even going to get to raise these babies as well. They're both going to disappear as well."

Dave gave one last longing look at the screen before leaving the cockpit with tears streaming down his face.

"Just leave him," Arnold put a hand on Kristine's shoulder to stop her from following Dave. "The boy's are still a sore point for him. He'll be fine tomorrow."

Kristine knew it was still a sore point for Arnold as well, even if he would never admit it himself. "I didn't realise he'd given up children before. If I knew- This must be hard for him. I don't know how he is doing this now know. I keep making assumptions from my Dave, but he's not my Dave. The difference are slight, but they make bigger changes the I assumed."

"I haven't finished with the console," Arnold said, turning back to his work.

"I'll help, I want to make sure my children are safe at all times," Kristine said, going over Arnold's work.

\- Red Dwarf -

Kristine watched Arnold and Dave as they held drinks and breakfast as still as possible while the whole ship shook, the lights blinking in and out, and the alerts lights all flashing and the alarms blaring. Once the ship had finished shaking Arnold continued drinking his tea and Dave continued on with breakfast. Kristine always expected Arnold to panic with every situation that came along like this and was surprised continuously during the times he didn't.

"This is just like the last time," Dave walked to the cockpit still eating his breakfast. Not at all rushed.

Arnold, on the other hand, raced into the cockpit after finishing his tea, attention directly on the console that was monitoring the twins. "The twins don't seem affected by the ship's shaking and power surge. What does Ace want this time?"

"Don't know?" Dave said as he waved to the other ship that was now outside. He continued on with his breakfast.

"Where did that come from?" Kristine questioned. It had not been on the screens when she'd been on shift before breakfast.

"Ace, good to see you again," Dave said through the radio link that he'd made with the other ship.

"Permission to come aboard old chum," Ace requested.

"Permission granted," Dave replied. It sounded cheerful, but Kristine could see both Dave and Arnold were looking worried.

"What's going on?" Kristine asked, seeing Arnold looking towards the medi-bay several times. She was worried about the twins as well with having people on the board. Kryten was already greeting Ace when they arrived in the cargo bay.

"Ace," Dave ran up to the look-alike of Arnold except better looking, hugging the man, more gently than the hugs Kristine had seen him giving to his other male friends.

"Skipper, Arnie and hello I don't believe we have met," Ace greeted her in a flirtatious tone which had Kristine swooning slightly after having to deal with Dave's directness about his attraction to her and Arnold's awkwardness around her.

"Ace this is Kristine Kochanski, she comes from another dimension," Dave introduced Kristine. "She got stuck with us when we came across a dimensional rift, and we haven't been able to get her home. Krissy, this is Rimmer from another dimension except he's not a smeghead like our Rimmer. We call him Ace." He turned his attention back to the alternate of Arnold. "What brings you here?"

"I have an appointment with Arnie," Ace said in a deeper voice then Arnold which had Kristine wondering if Arnold could talk like that instead of the nasally voice he had.

"Mister Ace, can I get you anything?" Kryten asked.

"Krytie, tea would be appreciated after I've spoken with Arnie," Ace replied.

"I'll get that ready at once," Kryten said. Leaving the humans in the cargo bay.

"Are you the same Ace we met last time?" Arnold asked after Kryten was out of hearing range.

"I am," Ace confirmed. "Been a good seven years for me since I saw you last. I know it's only been weeks here. My light-bee took a hit-"

"You mean he's a hologram?" Kristine interrupted, scrutinising him, looking for signs he was in fact a hologram and not seeing any.

"Yes I am a hologram," Ace confirmed. "My light-bee isn't as damaged as the last time I was here, it is still concerning enough that I need to pop in for a visit."

"You don't have a H, that is against the Space Corps directives," Kristine scolded.

"Don't you start on the Space Corps directives, I get enough of that from Rimmer and Kryten," Dave said.

"While it is against the Space Corps directives, I am never in one place long enough for anyone to enforce. We're in dead space, does it really matter?" Ace said.

"Let's get you to the medi-bay," Arnold said nervously.

Kristine and Dave made small talk with Ace as they walked to the medi-bay. Arnold was a nervous wreck by the time Ace was sitting on the examination table.

"That wasn't here last time," Ace noticed the artificial womb right away.

"These two have got a couple of buns in the oven. Another seven and a half months until they are born," Arnold felt a bit calmer as he looked the machine holding the growing twins. "Turns out Listy is his own father, Miss Kochanski his mother."

"And the second baby?" Ace raised an eyebrow noticing the two lots of vitals.

"Me from Krissy's dimension," Dave replied. "We need to time travel to the past to leave one of the twins where I was found. We also have to do the same for Krissy's Dave. We have a way to drop me off but not my other son, the baby from Kristine's dimension."

"Since you travel dimensions, can you take the baby and I home?" Kristine requested of Ace.

"If I know the dimension you are from I can take you home. Right now, I don't know where that is. When I do, I can take you both." Ace promised. He turned his attention to Arnold. "Soft-light?"

Arnold nodded, too nervous to talk as he connected up the diagnostic equipment to the light-bee.

"Can I travel with you to find my home dimension?" Kristine asked with hope.

Dave was heartbroken at the thought of Kristine going home so soon.

"You're better off staying here. A lot can go wrong travelling dimensions. Travelling with me long term is a dangerous occupation. It can also take time to find the exact coordinates for a dimension. There are millions of different dimensions out there. It could take hundreds of years if not thousands or more years to find the correct one. Once I have the correct one I can just pop in here and take you home like no time has passed at all." Ace explained.

"I need you to turn you off to finish your diagnostics," Arnold said before Kristine could ask any more questions.

Ace nodded his consent. It was silent for several moments as the three humans looked over the diagnostics. Kristine's face falling as she read through the results.

"This isn't good," Kristine's hope of going home deflated." Arnold sweetie, she placed a hand on Arnold's shoulder when she saw the confident grin. "We cannot fix this. I've never seen a light-bee as damaged as his. We should turn him back on so he can get his affairs in order."

"I can fix this," Arnold replied, the confidence hadn't faded at all.

"Arnold, his light-bee is fried," Kristine has the same concerned tone.

"It was worse last time he was here, and Rimmer fixed him," Lister intervened. "It was leaking a horrible green light. Rimmer's own light-bee has been more damaged then this on a few occasions.

Kristine didn't believe Dave or Arnold. They had to be exaggerating. "How can you possibly fix this? I can't fix this, and in case you haven't noticed I am the most qualified person here."

"Between my time working as a technician and my interest in self-preservation, I have learnt everything possible about holograms," Arnold said.

"From memory you weren't a very good technician," Kristine insinuated. "The same goes for Dave. You were the worst technicians on the ship."

"I'm just lazy, not bad," Dave replied.

"Isn't that true," Kristine had to agree with that. "I swear my Dave is nowhere near as lazy as you."

Dave rolled his eyes. He'd been expecting that.

Arnold turned Ace back on before any more arguing and insulting could take place.

"What's the prognosis, doc? It isn't good, is it?" Ace asked when he was turned back on.

"It's going to be tickety-boo," Arnold replied cheerfully. "You don't even need to be off while I do the repairs. Just a few corrupt files. It is going to be time-consuming while I fix the code so it might be better for you to be turned off the entire time. It's up to you if you want to be on or off. Have that tea and three-course meal Kryten has made for you before we start."

Kristine stormed out the door, angry with Arnold for believing he had lied to Ace.

"What's her problem?" Ace asked.

"She doesn't believe I can repair you, or that you're repairable at all," Arnold replied.

"I get the same results from Wildfire," Ace wasn't all surprised that Kristine would think the same. "You have the skills that no one else has when it comes to holograms. I know you can do it, Arnie. I'll choose to stay off. I'm a bit more Rimmery then Acey when it comes to medical stuff being performed on me. Will she be alright?"

"I'll go check on her," Dave said, racing out the medi-bay now that he knew Ace was going to be alright.

\- Red Dwarf -

Walking to get tea, Ace held Arnold back as they got to the dining room. He pointed to Kristine.

"Kris, Rimmer isn't lying. He really can fix Ace," Dave insisted.

"He's giving Ace false hope. I am familiar with holograms, as well. I know the limits of repairs that can be done."

"I know he's not good at many things, but this is something he can do and do well. He surprised us all with what he can do. He did such a good job the last time that he has been named the official repairman of hologram Ace." Dave took a seat and Kristine did the same.

Arnold took that as his sign to walk in but found himself held back by Ace again.

"I'm not sure if you know this about Rimmer or not. He spent his entire life trying to live up to his parent's expectations. They wanted him to be high up in the Space Corps like his brothers. I think they were all Captains or something like that. He's been trying to follow in his brother's footsteps. He's been trying to pass that impossible bar that his parents set for him instead of being his own person. It's only in the last couple of years that he has started to let go of those impossible tasks and find out who he is for himself. It's slow going, this is something he is good at. He can fix Ace."

Arnold was surprised that Dave was standing up for him.

"Arnold really is different them my Rimmer. All I can picture is the bumbling fool who mucked everything up. You know in my universe Captain Hollister kept assigning Rimmer all these impossible jobs to try and force him to leave the ship. When it didn't work the job's Rimmer was assigned slowly escalated in difficulty. We didn't realise it until after the accident until Rimmer accidentally killed the entire crew with his drive plate repair what was going on. Several other jobs Hollister assigned to him could have easily killed him or others."

"Rimmer was like that here as well," Dave confirmed. "He never left despite Hollister's treatment because he didn't have anywhere else to go. Sure he didn't have any friend on the ship, he also didn't have any off the ship. His family hated him, he didn't have anyone but himself. He couldn't hold down a relationship of any type. His job on Red Dwarf was all he had. He has more in death than when he was alive."

Arnold felt a stab each time Dave mentioned what he didn't have.

"You're his friend," Kristine said.

Arnold was expecting Dave to deny that when he did the opposite. "Yeah we're friends now, but I wasn't back then. That was forced because we were all each other had. I'm glad it was because despite his flaws he's a friend I wouldn't want to do without. Don't get me wrong Cat and Kryten are my friends, but they're not human. Rimmer is. Cat only cares for himself, I cannot have a proper conversation about anything deep and meaningful. Cat is fun. Kryten as much as he emulates a human it just isn't the same. Rimmer's been around for so long now that I find it hard to remember a time without him. I have now known him longer than anyone else in my life. I regret that Rimmer and I weren't friends from day one. The fun that we had together we could have been doing before the accident.

"We got attacked by this squid once that caused us all to hallucinate as a group, even Kryten and Rimmer despite them being digital life forms. In our hallucination, Red Dwarf was a game. My name was Sebastian Doyle, and Rimmer was William Billy Doyle. We were half brothers in the hallucination, same mother different fathers. Sometimes I wish he really was my brother. I always wanted a brother, I am an only child. Just me and gran after dad died. I've been alone since I was thirteen. Arnold and I have both been alone for different reasons. He's my family even though we don't share blood."

"Brother?" Arnold whispered. "He's not like my brothers."

"That's a good thing, they were all not worth knowing. We're better off without our blood brothers," Ace clapped his hands on Arnold's shoulder. "He is your brother all the same Arnie."

Kristine said, "I'm lucky I have parents who love me and a brother that was annoying who I still love. I have a family to return to if we ever find a way to the past. Do we really have to send the babies to that sort of life? Maybe they aren't you and my Dave."

Arnold took that as his queue to walk in. "They are and do you really want to raise them on Starbug on urine recyc water, cramped spaces, everything falling apart, low food for years on end?"

"Kristine, when Arnie fixes me up, come watch. You'll see that he knows what he's doing." Ace said calmly as he got himself some food that Kryten had set up.

"Just don't talk. It will interrupt his concentration and Rimmer gets nervous, and that is when he makes mistakes." Dave added.

"I think I'm nervous just knowing I'll be watched," Arnold said as he tried to keep the shaking out of his hands.

"First we have tea," Ace said not sure if the break would calm Arnold down or give him more time to become a nervous wreck.

\- Red Dwarf -

Ace wanting to show off to Kristine changed his mind about being turned off. Kristine sat next to Dave so they had visibility of what Arnold was doing but wouldn't block any of his light. Ace was connected up to more wires then when the diagnosis has been made, Arnold typing away at the console, sweat forming and dripping from his face, disappearing as soon as it left his skin.

Kristine had never seen Arnold in such a state of concentration before. He actually looked like he knew he was doing. She didn't know why she kept being surprised that Arnold knew how to do certain things. He was completely fine at his navigation console. He was the only one who knew what she was talking about when navigating, translating for Cat and Dave in a way they would understand. She did have to teach Arnold the correct terminology for what he had already been doing, and she believed he could pass the navigation test if he didn't know it was an exam.

Another thing that impressed her was his knowledge of the Space Corps directives. He knew them all without looking them up. The only thing that was an issue was the numbers that he kept getting incorrect, which suggested a learning problem of some form. A learning problem that should have been picked up years ago.

With his knowledge of the directives, Arnold would have made a decent Console Operator. A far better operator then he'd ever been as a vending machine technician. Arnold had been in the wrong field his entire time on the ship. There should have been considerations made for him with his learning difficulties, but they had never been diagnosed correctly. It was obvious now, and she'd been blind and never seen it herself.

"Rimmer, you alright?" Dave asked, being the one to break the silence. He'd obviously seen something that she'd missed.

Arnold pushed himself back from the console. "Why does so much of the programming have to incorporate numbers? They keep moving."

"What do you mean the number's keep moving? They're not moving." Dave said, looking over the console.

"Arnie, take all the time you need, you can even take a break if you need one." Ace said. "I'm going nowhere."

Arnold stalked out the medi-bay in a frustrated funk. Kristine took that as an opportunity to read through his work. Her eyes wide as she compared the original code to the altered code. Why hadn't she thought of that! It really was just a coding problem and not a physical problem with the light-bee. Because of the corruption to the code a wipe and reload to a save before the corruption wasn't possible, but manually re-writing it was. And now that she knew what he was doing, she knew that she could continue the fix.

"You weren't kidding, he really did know a way to fix you," Kristine exclaimed. "He's good, no better than good. I didn't know he had it in him. Why in the world didn't I see this myself? It is so simple and yet I really did think it was physical damage."

Dave was grinning, proud of Arnold. Something she never dreamed she would see.

"He's unique this Arnie," Ace said a reminiscent grin on his face. "Believe me when I say I have met a lot of Arnold Rimmers. None of the other's can look after a light-bee like he can. Speaking of Rimmer's not like the other, I found one to train those who are not yet ready to become Ace."

"What makes him different?" Dave asked.

"He's more like the original Ace; however, he has never been Ace. His timeline split when Project Wildfire ended up as a failure and didn't launch him into another dimension. It did still work for jumping to different places within their time. It changed space travel in that dimension. He was given the opportunity to be Ace when he was still working for the Space Corps. He turned it down due to his family, married with three children. When I met him, he was retired and now a grandfather. He's really good with the kids to my surprise. I've never had anything to do with children."

"Rimmer being married is a bit of a surprise, but him being good with kids isn't. He was a big help with my two when they were around. They can't live in this dimension, so they went to live with their mum in her dimension. Reverse gender version of myself."

"Heard about Deb's and Arlene's and reverse gender universes. Never been to any. Apparently, the female Ace is quite the looker."

"Arnie doesn't look like he's going to be back anytime soon, I'm going to take a moment to stretch my legs." Ace said, standing up from the exam table.

\- Red Dwarf -

Kristine didn't watch Arnold do any more of his repairs to Ace once he returned from his break. She did, however, go over his work just to see what had been done and she was still impressed that this came from Arnold of all people.

"Miss Kochanski," Ace said as soon as she turned off the diagnosis machine. "Wildfire will bring whatever Ace is in charge to you and that baby of yours to bring you back to your dimension when we find it. If you choose to come back, they will bring you back."

"Why would I choose to stay?" Kristine asked. "All I want is to return to my Dave, Kryten and Cat."

"You'd be surprised the number of people I have returned home who don't stay home very long because they miss where they have been, they grow attached, things change and move on without them that home no longer feels like home. Now if you excuse me, I need to say goodbye to Arnie and Skip before I leave."

"Oh Mister Ace, you are going so soon?" Kryten had overheard.

"That I am Krytie. It's been a pleasure as always." Ace turned to Dave. "Skip, look after Arnie for me. He lacks confidence and needs to keep building it up. Please don't topple that confidence. You have power over him that no one else does. He listens to what you say." Dave went to reply. "Don't argue with me Skip, I know what I am talking about, my Listy would do the same to me."

Ace found Arnold in the cockpit looking at the display with the unborn twins' vitals.

"Arnie, I owe you my life twice over. You are gifted in an area that none of the other Ace's are. Keep being your own person," Ace said quietly. "Don't live in father, Mother, John, Frank or Howards shadow any longer and most importantly don't live in Ace's shadow either. We are not the same, but that doesn't mean that you are not important."


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

Arnold was sitting at the table in the kitchen. For a change of scenery from his bedroom and the drive room. He was attempting to reading one of the manuals on the holographic system and wasn't getting very far. He'd come here for some peace and quiet because Lister had been fidgeting in their bunk room and Cat had been preening in the cockpit. He'd had a short while on his own before Kryten had interrupted him by pacing around the kitchen complaining to himself which had become a common occurrence ever since Kristine had got stuck with them.

Arnold threw his book down in a huff. "Kryten, what are you blathering on about this time?"

"It's all Miss Kochanski's fault," the droid whined.

Arnold rolled his eyes, oh so predictable that was. Everything had been Kristine's fault according to the droid ever since she'd got trapped in their dimension.

"What is her fault this time? Is her underwear upsetting the clothes dryer again? Or did she find more salad cream?" Arnold asked about the two most regular things that had set Kryten off.

"Mister Lister and even Mister Cat choose her over the lobster I made for dinner," Kryten pointed to the dinner that had been laid on the table while he'd been reading. Arnold took a good look at the lobster. It looked real, but Kryten had become an expert at making their limited supplies look more palatable.

"Is it space weevil dressed to look like lobster?" Arnold asked. Kryten had been dressing space weevil up as all sorts of food since it was their only source of meat. If space weevil could count as meat. The vermin was often it was their only source of food.

Kryten turned around offended. "It is real lobster! Why does everyone keep assuming it is space weevil?" He threw his arms up in the air with a huff.

"Because we haven't had real food for weeks. Where did you get a real lobster from?" Arnold asked, poking the lobster in disbelief. "And why would you choose to cook something that is so endangered? It's probably extinct now." Not that he cared about a species that he assumed was already extinct.

"Can you believe they choose virtual reality over this wonderful meal that I spent two days making? Two days and it was all for nothing. They don't appreciate anything I do for them." Kryten didn't answer where he had got the lobster from.

"They went into virtual reality and didn't tell me?" Arnold sighed. He thought he was making progress with the small crew. He thought that he and Kristine were actually friends, that he was chums with the entire crew. The first fun thing that comes along and they hadn't even told him. They'd probably excluded him on purpose. "Do you know what they are playing?"

"Jane Austen World," Kryten replied.

Arnold scrunched up his face at the memories of playing Jane Austen World as a child. "I'm familiar with that title. It is one of the few my mother would let me play, and I always had to play with her. It was supposed to be training on how to act like a proper gentleman, but I knew that she was conducting affairs with the computer sprites while I was with some dour old woman who was teaching me manners. The clothes mother used to make me wear were so uncomfortable. I was the only one that she'd ever take into virtual reality. My brothers were always spending bonding time with my father when I was forced to spend time with Mother."

Arnold picked his book back up. "Just thinking about that game is bringing up so many unpleasant memories of my mother." He wasn't going to join them, and he had to be prepared for the next time Ace turned up needing to be repaired. He wouldn't let himself feel upset about them not asking them to join them. He needed to focus on the task of repairing Ace. He didn't know how to do most of the repairs in the book. It was also making him nauseous knowing how many ways a light-bee could be damaged that he hadn't previously known about. His anxiety was going wild imagining each mention of destruction happening to himself.

Kryten, on the other hand, looked as though he would be joining the others in virtual reality since he'd left in the direction of the gaming suite.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold was just getting absorbed into his book when the rest of the crew came storming back into the kitchen without Kryten.

Dave slumped next to him. "Kryten's gone nuts. He blew up Jane Austen World with a tank." He said in a low voice, in order for Kryten not to hear. "All because we choose to play a game instead of eating lobster. I don't even like lobster."

"I wish I had a tank to blow up Jane Austen World when my mother used to force me to play," Arnold wished he'd been in the game to see that. He seemed to always miss all the non-dangerous fun.

"I don't like being blown up. Explosions clashed with this suit," Cat complained. "No one saw me in this suit during no explosion. That was not me."

The human crew members ignored Cat during his fashion crisis.

"Sir's and ma'am," Kryten waddled back in. "I'm glad that you could join me this evening."

They were all silent as Kryten served up lobster, even to Arnold, who hadn't been eating real food due to the shortage of supplies.

"Are you sure I should be eating this? Our supplies are low?" Arnold asked. Moving his seat closer to Dave when he saw the murderous glare from Kryten.

"Of course sir, this is a special occasion," Kryten replied in a sing-song voice.

They all starred at the meal that didn't look or smell appetising at all. Kryten was looking at them all with anticipation.

Arnold picked up his fork, placing a small amount of lobster on his fork. It smelt horrible "Oh what terrible timing," Arnold lied as the fork fell through his hand as he shifted to soft-light. "My light-bee has malfunctioned. What terrible timing, I can't eat food at the moment. It looked like such a lovely meal as well."

Kristine was hiding a look of disgust as she took a bite of her lobster. Dave wasn't having as much luck hiding his disgust.

"Arnold, it is such a shame your light-bee is playing up now. It's such a lovely meal. In fact, it is so lovely I should take my time to repair your drive so you can share this meal with us," Kristine said.

Arnold looked between Kristine and Dave having no idea if she intended to use him to get out of the meal altogether or if she was going to force him to try the vile meal.

"I wouldn't want you to miss out on this fabulous meal," Arnold insisted and continued on before she could come up with a counter-argument. "It's days like today that I miss Holly. She would be sure to make sure I could taste this wonderful meal."

"Yeah, it's good, like really good," Dave was looking wearily in Kryten's direction who was missing the cues of disgust. "Such a shame you're stuck in whatever mode that is preventing you from eating. I should help Kristine in repairing you. It really wouldn't take much time at all."

Dave's look suggested that he was going to force Arnold to eat the horrible meal.

Cat was looking between the three humans in confusion as they continued to compliment Kryten's cooking and say how much they were missing out in Arnold's care. "Are we eating the same stuff?" Cat looked down at his own meal with disgust. "Mine is disgusting."

Kryten's face fell. "I don't know why I bother. No one appreciates what I do."

"I appreciate you," Dave insisted.

"I appreciate that you clean up after this clown," Arnold pointed to Dave, meaning every word. "His living space was a mess when I was soft-light and could only rely on the scutters. He would never clean up after himself, and the scutters wouldn't listen to me most of the time. So the room remained a mess."

"I don't think I would be able to manage picking up after Dave without you. He leaves enough mess even with you cleaning most of it." Kristine agreed.

"Kryten, may I have some ketchup?" Dave asked.

Arnold was already ducking under the table, and Kristine had moved her chair back.

"You want ketchup with lobster?" Kryten's head started to steam. "Ketchup with lobster?"

"Just the brown stuff, it's not like I have no class," Dave said.

"What class? You don't have any class," Arnold said from under the table."

"Kryten, you know I need a bit of a pep up with my food," Dave said.

"Brown ketchup with, I simply cannot," Kryten didn't get to finish his thought. Dave watched as more steam came out, Arnold covered his head, and Kristine moved further and further back while the Cat was oblivious to what was going on. Kryten's head exploded all over the kitchen, most of it landing all over the meal he'd spend hours preparing, making it even more in-edible then it already was.

When Arnold was sure, no more explosions would take place, he came out from under the table. "That's new."

"Well done bud," Cat stood up in offence. "Now we have to do the washing up." Cat threw down his napkin. "He's literally blown his top. Cat do this, Cat do that. What am I, a dog?" Cat stalked out of the room with the three humans' rolling their eyes at him. Cat would never do the washing up even if he were asked. So far they hadn't asked for his assistance.

"I suppose we should fix him," Dave said as he started gathering bits of Kryten's head.

"I vote that we leave him dead. It is so much more peaceful without him. He's one step away from actually killing us." Arnold said, knowing that Dave would get his way and that Kryten would end up repaired.

\- Red Dwarf -

The crew of the Red Dwarf didn't fix Kryten right away. Arnold wanted to finish reading his book in peace. Kristine wanted a few moments without Kryten pestering her because she was just being herself. And Dave felt guilty about not fixing Kryten got everything ready in the medical bay until the other two would help him.

"I've fixed him before, I can fix him again," Dave said as they finished checking for all of Kryten's different pieces. He'd finally he'd convinced the other two to help him.

"The last time he fixed Kryten he was pregnant with the twins," Arnold reminisced. "This time he's only in two pieces if you count his exploded head as one piece and his body as a second. Last time Kryten was a jigsaw puzzle.

"No, that was the first time he was broken. The last time I had to fix him was on the psy-moon that your crazy mind came up with. He's got chopped in half." Dave corrected.

"And you put his legs on backwards," Arnold reminded Dave. "You did a better job fixing him when he was a jigsaw puzzle."

"Why was Kryten in pieces?" Kristine asked.

They had Kryten laid out in the medi-bay getting everything in order while Dave and Arnold told her the story about how they had found Kryten on the Nova 5, something which also happened in Kristine's dimension. Where their two dimensions differed was Kryten never left Kristine when he'd been found.

"Kryten left us on Listy's bike, and months later we find him smashed on an asteroid. It kept Lister preoccupied while he fixed him back up again," Arnold finished the story.

Kristine looked at the two boys. "Why didn't you send Kryten up to the botanical gardens? That is what my Kryten did after we found him on the Nova 5. I helped him transport all his plants to the garden and just let him go."

"Did your Kryten redecorate your quarters to look more feminine? Frilly stuff everywhere, I rather liked it, reminded me of my grandmother's home. The grandmother I liked, she was the only blood relative I ever got along with, on my mother's side. My mother hated her, just like I hated my mother." Arnold realised a moment later that he'd admitted to liking the frills and stuff, but when no one else mentioned it, he didn't bring it up again. "After that, Kryten dumped all his files about woman, which is probably why he doesn't know how to deal with you."

"My Kryten hasn't had to dump any memory. I found a way to expand his memory, so he didn't have to," Kristine said, looking at Kryten's memory that was still intact. "I could." She waved to the memory that was still intact.

"Maybe later, we need to rebuild him first," Dave said as he started trying to figure out how to build his head.

"Why are you rebuilding him? Isn't this the reason Kryten has spare heads in the first place?" Arnold asked.

"I'll just go get one of them," Dave said, coming back moments later with all the spare heads. It didn't take long to remove the memory from spare head one and place Kryten's memory in there. "That should do the trick," Dave said as he clicked everything in place. "Let's boot him up."

Kristine frowned, "You sure you know what you are doing?"

"Hey," Dave said with a shrug of his shoulders and a confident grin plastered over his face while Arnold rolled his eyes.

Kristine turned Kryten back on who took moments to boot. "Ketchup, with lobster! You want-" Kryten's head exploded before he finished his sentence.

"I thought you said you knew what you were doing?" Kristine said as she looked at the exploded mess.

"No, I just said hey, if you let me finish, I would've said hey no, I don't," Dave defended himself.

"We both know that you weren't going to say anything else after that hey," Arnold rolled his eyes again. "Let's get this mess cleaned up and try again if his memory is still intact."

\- Red Dwarf -

The memory was recovered from exploded spare head one, the memory was removed from spare head two and Kryten's memory placed in. This time they connected Kryten up to the diagnosis system and were looking through the programming.

"Arnold, you work with hologram programming on a regular basis. Do you notice anything that is triggering the explosions? I see nothing?" Kristine asked.

"Are you going to ask if I see anything?" Dave asked.

"David, you don't see anything," Kristine dismissed him.

"I have no clue what I am looking at," Arnold finally admitted after several minutes of fighting with his ego which didn't want to admit he was as lost as everyone else. "Mechanoid programming is different from hologram programming. I have no clue what to even look for. The manual is useless, it just says to send back to Diva Droid for repair."

Dave leaned in closer to look through the code that made no sense. "Rimmer would know nothing about holograms if it wasn't so important to his self-preservation."

"There is nothing wrong with that," Kristine replied. "If I was a hologram I would want to know everything about myself and how to fix problems."

"Do we put spare head three on to see if the body will still explode without the memory? Maybe there is something in his body that is triggering the explosion," Arnold suggested.

"That is a good point, there could be something in his body, not just his memory that is causing him to explode. What do we have to lose?" Kristine agreed.

"Do we do this with or without his memory chip?" Dave asked.

"I don't want to be exploded, I saw what you did to spare head one and two, I object," Spare head three said. He was trying to bite Dave's hand as he picked him up.

"Just keep him as is," Arnold said.

Dave and Kristine both ignored him as they opened up Spare head three and removed his memory chip before placing connecting it up with Kryten's body and booting him.

"Well we know that it's not anything else in the body causing any issues," Dave said while he disconnected Spare head three.

"Maybe you should put spare head one or two's memory in there instead of three," Arnold suggested. "I don't trust spare head three not to kill us."

"He's not going to kill us, his droid-rot has made him a bit grumpy, but he's not going to kill us," Dave said, ignoring Arnold and using spare head three's memory. "Who'd to say that it's not other components in his head causing the droid rot?"

"Still no explosions," Kristine said. "That's good, that means that the problem is with the memory. You mentioned before that Kryten has been dumping his own memory, we erase today and everything should be fine."

"Kryten has been working on that lobster for two days. Who is to say how long he's been planning the lobster. I say we remove lobster from his database just like he removed woman from his database." Arnold said.

Dave didn't look too sure about that plan. "I don't like changing who he is. It feels wrong."

"Dave, if we don't remove those memories, we may never get Kryten back." Kristine soothed. "Would you prefer Kryten as he is or with a few memories missing?"

"I'd prefer to have Kryten around," Dave said after several moments. "And you aren't not changing anything else, just the lobster thing."

\- Red Dwarf -

Dave paced as Kristine and Arnold had gone through Kryten's memories, removing all traces of that day and lobster from his database just in case it triggered him again.

"This looks better than last time," Kristine said as she finished double checking all the memories they removed and the code that they'd changed. "I guess we should turn him on."

Before any of them could have second thoughts, Arnold turned Kryten on who didn't explode.

"Hey, Krytie are you feeling alright?" Dave asked the droid when he'd regained consciousness.

"What are we doing in the medi-bay?" Kryten asked as he looked around.

"Your head exploded," Dave said as gently as possible. "Some permanent harm was done. We put your memory into spare head one who may have also exploded. We worked out what was causing your problems, and now you're in spare head two, and the good news is you didn't explode."

"Bad news is you are down to the spare head with droid rot if anything happens in the future," Arnold said cheerfully.

"My goodness, any idea what caused me to explode?" Kryten asked, looking slightly shocked. "I don't feel like myself anymore. My head just looks wrong."

"Kryten, do you know what this is?" Arnold held up a picture of a lobster, both Kristine and Dave took a step back as they saw the lobster.

"Should I know what it is?" Kryten asked. "Is it a GELF?"

"Everything is just peachy, nothing wrong," Arnold put the picture away.

"Kryten, we need to run your self-repair and some diagnostics," Kristine said.

"Of course ma'am. Does Mister Lister need any dinner first?" Kryten requested.

Arnold glared at Dave who looked like he was about to ask for food.

"Nah, you just get better Kryten," Dave said, patting the droid on the shoulder.

Kryten put himself into repair mode after Dave managed to convince him that he was, in fact, fine, which took several minutes that they were almost ready to give in and tell Kryten to make dinner.

\- Red Dwarf -

"Is chewed pencil head still headless?" Cat asked when they entered the cockpit.

"He's repaired," Kristine sighed heavily as she sat down, once again in Arnold's spot. Arnold glared at her from behind.

They were all surprised to see Cat in the cockpit actually manning it despite not being asked or bribed.

"Anything interesting out there?" Dave asked as he took his seat to check on everything for himself.

"Just that ship," Cat pointed to the radar.

"The Centauri, hey do you think it has any spare parts for Kryten?" Dave said, already pulling up the list. "We're down to one spare head,"

"Do you know when the Centauri was built?" Kristine asked. She was not finding the information in the database and didn't know why she asked the boys as if they would know. Kryten was the one that would possibly know, and he was still in the medi-bay. "If it's too early or too late we won't be able to get any spare parts for him."

Arnold shook his head no while Dave shrugged and Cat started listing every century that space travel had been around in and even somewhere space travel while around was not as advanced as the ship they were looking at.

Kristine sighed and turned around. "Let's ask someone more intelligent. Hello wall, what do you think?"

Arnold shook his head again.

"Hang on," Dave continued typing away at the console. "I'll just be a moment getting your answer."

"What are you doing?" Kristine asked, leaning forward to get a better look.

"Logging onto their mainframe," Dave answered like it was the simplest thing. "If there is a Diva Droid signature on their supply inventory it's possible they might have some mech heads around."

Kristine blinked and started and then blinked again. "Why didn't I think of that? How did you even know to do that?"

"It's what we've always done before we scavenge a derelict," Arnold replied, surprised that she didn't do that. "Don't want to put ourselves into unnecessary danger. If there is nothing on board or its full of simulants, then we don't bother."

"Rimmer's a worrywart, always needs to check how safe it will be first," Dave said as if it was stupid to worry about simulants and other threats.

"It's saved your bacon several times," Arnold huffed.

"Bingo," Dave exclaimed, "Diva Droid signature right here and supplies of assorted spare parts."

"But there is also a simulant," Arnold pointed to another scanner which detected life forms both organic and artificial.

Kristine was surprised that she'd never thought of logging into a mainframe herself to check for supplies. Then again, her crew had never been desperate for any supplies.

\- Red Dwarf -

After much arguing which Arnold ended up winning it was agreed that he would stay behind and keep an eye on the scanners and Kryten. The rest had dressed up as GELFs to trade with the simulant. It was a stupid plan if you asked him.

"Back already?" Arnold turned around, seeing the ugly costumed crew return. "So how did it-" he took a step back. "Go?"

He squeaked as what turned out to be a real GELF ran towards him. He dived out of the way. The shock of seeing the real GELF caused him to switch to soft-light, which had been a terrible mistake as he was manhandled by the GELF who was faster then he looked.

"You're not Kristine or Cat are you?" Arnold asked despite knowing he wasn't going to like the answer. "You're a real GELF, aren't you?"

The GELF grunted.

"And what brings you here? I mean it is a lovely part of the galaxy. But you really don't need to see our rustbucket of a ship? It doesn't have much to offer." He nervously spoke the ear off the GELF, hoping that he'd let him go.

He was helpless as the GELF raided their ship of much-needed supplies and he was unhelpful as he ended up telling the GELF were some supplies were, or to helpful depending on the context. Never once did the GELF let him go.

Arnold looked at the artificial uterus nervously. If the GELF noticed the twins oh he didn't even want to think about it. Arnold tried to hide his nerves as the GELF walked closer and closer to the growing babies. Arnold tried to hide his relief when instead the GELF noticed Kryten.

"Oh him, you don't want him," Arnold said. "He's faulty, blew up two heads already today. The parts are still scattered around." Arnold looked towards the mess. They were going to have to have a big clean-up after the day was through if they survived. "Though if you want a faulty mechanoid, be my guest. More trouble then he's worth if you ask me. I didn't want to keep him in the first place."

The GELF grunted again, not letting go of his light-bee as he grabbed Kryten, dragging him out of the ship. He continued talking nervously about Kryten and the lobster as they were dragged over to the simulant ship.

"Listy!" Arnold screamed at the top of his non-existent lungs. He wasn't heard. His bunkmate was somewhere on the ship too far away to hear.

"The hologram is too noisy," the simulant said in a crackly voice.

The GELF grunted in agreement.

Arnold's light-bee almost fried itself at the sight of the simulant in front of him. "List-" Arnold's screams cut off as the simulant took his light-bee from the GELF and turned him off.

\- Red Dwarf -

Arnold had no clue how long he'd been turned off for. To his horror he was still with the simulant, Kryten was nowhere in sight.

"Where is the bomb?" The simulant asked him while pacing around.

"What bomb?" Arnold asked. What in the world was the simulant blathering on about? He was trying to get his bearing. He didn't know for how long he'd been turned off. The simulant was going on about a bomb which wasn't making any sense to him.

"The bomb that your crew members planted before they ran away?" The simulant continued pacing, which was making Arnold a bit dizzy."

Arnold was speechless for a few moments. "They planted a bomb and have left me to die? That's it, they are not getting a Christmas card from me this year, no soiree."

"Mister Rimmer, sir," Arnold heard Kryten's voice from behind him. "What happened to Mister Lister?"

Arnold turned seeing Kryten was standing with another mechanoid. The other mechanoid seemed to be in worse condition then Kryten, his face looking even more malformed then Kryten if that was possible. The new droid was cased in green instead of black like Kryten. He must have been a cheaper model then Kryten has been.

"So neither of you know about the bomb," the simulant asked.

Arnold stayed still. He'd just realised there was no bomb. There were no bombs aboard Starbug. If there had been, they would've accidentally blown themselves up by now. What was Dave playing at? Did he know that they were not on the ship when they left? Or had they left on purpose? No, they couldn't have left on purpose, they never would have left Kryten behind, him yes but not Kryten unless it was Kristine leaving Kryten behind. But he thought that he and Kristine were friends, she wouldn't leave him behind, would she? Then again, he was an expert at reading things wrong.

"If you don't know about the bomb then we will use you against the human's," The simulant said, beaming them aboard Starbug. Both he and Kryten still held hostage.

"We know about the bomb," the simulant called out.

Arnold looked as Cat, Dave and Kristine waltzed into the cargo bay where they had materialised.

"So we did plant a bomb. I was beginning to wonder," Cat exclaimed still oblivious that there was no bomb.

"Where did you hide the bomb?" The simulant demanded. "Speak, or you will spend the rest of the days getting mech out of your clothing."

"Already done that twice today what's a third time," Arnold said before his brain caught up with his mouth.

"Can I change first?" Cat requested trying to work out what outfits he had that would go with mech explosions. He could not be seen getting exploded on in the same outfit twice in one day.

Dave took a step forward. "Hand over Rimmer and Kryten, and I will tell ya."

"Oh no, I don't think so. I believe the mech will go first," The simulant said, turning to Kryten. "Before you go, there is something that you need to know about your creator."

Arnold was trying to get his breathing under control as the simulant explained to Kryten how to access a previously hidden file.

"Oh my," Kryten gasped as he accessed the file before going into a daze.

"I'll let him process that first, so the hologram or the woman. I will flip a coin," The simulant pulled a coin out from between some of his circuitry. "Head for the woman, tails for the hologram."

Arnold was leaning towards the coin so he could know if it would be him or Kristine that was going to die first. He was hoping that it wasn't him.

"Not me, not me, not me." He was whispering to himself. "Not me!" He said happily and a lot louder, which got a glare from Dave.

Before he could give another response, he turned to see the green droid advancing upon them. Arnold covered his head as the droid approached.

"Heads," the droid that belonged to the simulant screamed, hitting both the simulant and the GELF in the head.

"Rimmer, what was that about? Not me?" Dave glared.

"I didn't want to die. I thought I was going to die," Arnold complained. "I don't want to be dead."

Dave glared. "You're already dead."

"That's not the point."

"Sir's you really should not be arguing now," Kryten said. "Able would you like to help me get these two off the ship?"

"We should flush them out the airlock," Arnold said as they loaded the unconscious enemy onto the Centauri. "They are just going to come after us and kill us as soon as they wake up. It won't kill the simulant. They don't need air to breathe."

As soon as Kryten was on the ship, Arnold closed the door not allowing Able back in. He knew that would upset Kryten and everyone else. They had limited resources as it was, they could not afford to have another mech around unless it was for spare parts and that mech seemed a bit more haywire then Kryten had been before his head exploded. Kryten hadn't noticed since he was heading back up to the medi-bay to finish his diagnostics. The information about his creator seemed to have upset him slightly but hadn't had whatever effect the simulant had intended.

"Where's Able?" Dave asked when Arnold returned to the drive room.

"He decided to stay behind," Arnold replied.

Dave turned. "Rimmer, did you leave him behind on purpose? He's going to be killed by the simulants."

Arnold returned Dave's glare. "Yes, I left Able behind. It's for the good of the crew, we already have one haywire mechanoid in Kryten and from what I saw of the green mechanoid he is even more haywire then Kryten. He's going to get us killed either by accident while looking for that stuff he kept using the entire time I was on the simulant ship, or it is a trick, and he's still working for the simulant and thinks that we can take him to something better then what this rustbucket has."

"We need to go back for him," Dave was about to turn the ship back when they felt an explosion. The simulant and or the GELF were awake, and now they were being chased.

"Dave, I agree with Arnold. Able would have been dangerous to keep around," Kristine said as they tried to navigate away. The explosion had brought Kryten from the medi-bay and Cat from wherever he'd slunk off to.

"We're never going to outrun them, we're all doomed," Arnold complained as the ship shook again from getting hit by a blast from the simulant ship.

"We can go into the asteroid field and try to hide," Kristine was bringing up the navigation console, directing them on where they had to go.

"Land here," she commanded, they flew into a cave on a larger asteroid that would protect them from smaller asteroids. "Power everything down that isn't essential so they cannot trace us."

Arnold hated low power mode. He could see through his eyelids, but at least he was still turned on. Kryten was running on his lowest setting possible.

"After all that did you manage to get what we came here for?" Arnold asked.

"We have spare mech parts," Dave confirmed.

Kryten looked around realising for the first time that they were missing someone. "Where is Able?"

"Rimmer here left him behind on purpose," Dave said still stroppy about it.

"Hey guys, what was that explosionie smell?" Cat asked.

They ran to the cockpit, a message flashing on the console.

"It's from Able," Kryten said. "He took control of the simulant ship, and he's crashed it. He killed himself to save us."

"Maybe he survived, we'll go check it out," Dave said already taking off despite Arnold's objections about the simulant and GELF possibly still being alive.

\- Red Dwarf -

The small crew stood to the side as Kryten placed Able into a grave he'd spent hours digging.

"I didn't know Able long, he was my brother," Kryten said of the droid he'd only known for a few hours.

"Waste of parts if you ask me," Arnold muttered, thankfully not heard by Dave but was heard from Kristine.

"As soon as they're gone we'll take everything useful," Kristine whispered back which had Arnold looking up in surprise. He never expected anyone to agree with him.

A smile made its way to his face before he pushed it away and tried to look sombre, so Dave or Kryten didn't suspect a thing.

"Who knows when we will come across parts that Kryten needs," Kristine whispered.

They had to wait until Dave was asleep and Kryten was finishing his diagnostics before they could go outside and dig Able back up.

"What are you two doing, looking guilty like that?" Cat snuck up from behind them.

"Getting some more spare parts," Kristine replied. "You have to promise not to tell Dave or Kryten."

"Why should I do that?" Cat asked.

"You don't have to do drive duty tonight," Arnold replied. "And the next shiny thing we find is yours."

"My shiny," Cat took something off the mechanoid before disappearing.

The ultrazone that Able had been taking had fried most of his components. There wasn't much they were able to take other than the limb casings. They'd left the body case behind on purpose. Kryten would know where they got that if he ever found it.

"His memory chip is still intact," Kristine said as she pulled it out.

"What do we do with that?" Arnold asked, looking at the chip that looked better condition than Kryten's own.

Kristine placed it back on top of the mechanoid parts they weren't taking. "Let's get the parts inside and leave this place before Dave and Kryten notice."

Arnold helped Kristine, his mood the most uplifted it had been for a while as they left the days adventures behind.


End file.
